More or Less
by Stuart Curien
Summary: Can a man ever move away from what he was born to be? 47 exacts a bloody revenge on Agency for the death of Padre Vittorio, but he cannot kill his memories of the old man's teachings. Reviews welcome!
1. Default Chapter

The three bullet wounds were perfectly placed, forming a small, neat triangle around the man's heart. He had been lying still for just over a minute now, the faint smell of cordite in the air overwhelmed by a growing stench as every muscle in his body relaxed.

He wore an expression of rigid shock, which was normal. Even when you pointed the barrel at someone, told them why you were there, they still couldn't believe it when the slug ripped home. All their preconceived notions of dying among friends and relatives, wise and respected, in graceful old age were made false in an instant.

With wife and child?

Phillip Clausen was dead, but his killer lingered in the room, their gloved hands picking up a framed photograph from the desk which was quietly studied. There was a girl in the picture, seven, maybe eight years old, she wore a practised smile born of too many such portraits, an affectionate impatience at the man stood behind the camera.

The assassin tilted his head slightly, as though trying to form an opinion of the girl, and set the frame back down with a care which belied his profession. He had never really understood the concept of photographs, it was yet another facet of the normal world which he neither needed nor cared for; he had been created to never forget a single detail, face, or location, although sometimes he did wonder what it might be like to go chasing after a memory.

Sliding the Beretta 92SD back into its shoulder holster, he walked over to the corpse and squatted down. There were more photographs in the wallet; a middle-aged, chestnut haired woman with a kind smile and two more of the girl, they sat easily beside a wedge of dollar bills, several credit cards, and an old receipt for the gleaming Rolex watch clipped to Clausen's wrist.

_Murderer. _

The word held meaning but no emotion, even when he imagined it screaming from the mouths of the wife and child, of them cursing his existence, he felt nothing.

He knew what he was _supposed_ to be experiencing, the others in his trade had often spoken of it, many times had he endured such confessions and catharsis without inviting them. That was in the beginning, of course, when they had assumed he was simply another contract killer, that he had shared, or, at least, understood some measure of what they were going through.

'…_.like someone had filled my veins with ice. I couldn't stop shaking, it must have been the adrenaline, I never suspected……I mean, I didn't think…..You see all that bullshit in the movies, one bullet, cold, clean, but it stays with you, you're connected to the person you killed in such a horrible…….intimate way._

'Like the worst kind of love' he had suggested, and the other man regarded him with a cold, frightened awe.

It didn't take long for the other workers to distance themselves, at first they were most eager to be around someone so apparently skilled in disposals, but that soon changed the more time they spent with him. He was _too_ in control, the dozen different strip clubs they had visited; where alcohol flowed plentifully and the air was filled with a constant, thick haze of cigarette smoke, failed to excite or intoxicate him in any way.

The dancers somehow instinctively knew to stay away, although when they did attempt to arouse him, gyrating and grinding their half-naked bodies, constant failure to draw the desired response bristled each and every one of them.

He once overheard a dancer say to her friend that it was like 'trying to get a statue turned on', and couldn't argue with that assessment. His demeanour was not even pliant enough for the strippers to consider him a challenge, it was as though they finally sensed that it was impossible to tease the tight, immovable line of his lips into a smile, so all as one they ceased to try.

No doubt Professor Ort-Meyer had intended him to be that way, the most deadly human in existence, one troubled by neither conscience or emotion. After the death of Padre Vittorio he had returned to the Asylum, now derelict after his massacre there several years ago, and broke into Meyer's lab in the hope of finding some answers.

Predictably, other interested parties had stripped the place bare long ago, the only indications that anything ever occurred was congealed blood between the tiles – evidence which had stubbornly resisted a last minute cleanup. He stayed for a time, pulling up a battered office chair and silently contemplating, so still that occasionally rats would dart from shadow to shadow right in front of him.

He recalled his battle with the other clones, and most recently the unknown sniper which Agency had hired to kill him in St Petersburg, wondering at the perverse delight which they seemed to take in murder.

Was he a failed experiment rather than the perfect result? Why create an assassin who questions what he is, why allow _him_ to live when you possess an army of sadistic warriors all too content in their roles?

Too many questions, no answers.

As usual, he returned to what he did best, the only thing he knew, only now his target was The Agency, those who had betrayed him and sentenced an innocent Priest to death.

Diana Burnwood.

They were running scared now, moving from location to location, doubling security and leaving a trail of false information to draw him away. Clausen was the third to die so far, a hunt which had led him to New York after eliminating section heads in Venice and Hamburg. The German had protected himself better than most, arranging a protective guard of Special Forces equipped with Spectra armour and impressive assault weaponry.

Half of them were taken out of the picture when he activated the building's Haylon extinguisher system, draining the oxygen from the air before many could secure their masks. The rest fought well, they were trained by the best, but ultimately even the best could snap if they witnessed a man who killed with the cold lethality of a machine.

The last guard begged for mercy, he was just doing his job, he didn't want to die, yet he could rest assured that when the knife slit his throat it was nothing personal.

Returning Clausen's wallet, the assassin ran his fingers over the dead man's eyes, closing them.

'I forgive you'.


	2. Chapter2

'_Padre, is it possible for a man to exist without a soul?__'__. _

_Father Vitorrio leant back in his worn wicker chair, enjoying the sensations of the early evening warmth on his face, __'__no, my son, everything on this earth that lives and breathes has a soul. God would allow nothing less__'__. _

_Sipping at his wine, the other man considered. He wore plain, unflattering workman-like clothes, although the muscular body beneath would have improved any garment. Despite his constant, continued work in the summer sun, there was no__ colouration__ of the exposed skin; his perfectly smooth, bald head remained forever pale, just as there was neither the smallest indication of any shaven facial hair._

_For a time he had lived in the cities, moving from place to place in search of respite, but a choice encounter with street thugs in Paris reminded him all too well that such respite could not be found amongst others. All they wanted was his money but programmed instincts had snapped into action, he measured the next moments in blows, the dry snapping of broken bones, and three men lay dead at his feet. _

'_I know that everything which is born naturally possesses a soul__'__ he agreed, putting a strange emphasis on the word __"__naturally__"__ which caused__ Vitorrio__ to shiver involuntarily, __'__but what of the artificial creation of lives? Genetic engineering? Where does God stand when we place ourselves in his role?__'__. _

_Sighing, the Priest raised a finger to his lips thoughtfully, __'__I cannot deny that lines have become blurred, nor that it does not disturb me to say this. We have advanced so far__……__and yet we still know so little of our world, there are some who would say we know everything, that we no longer need God, but these are the bold and fearful words of lost children__'__. _

'_I long for peace__'__ the worker admitted, __'__sometimes I believe it is a peace which can only be found in death, but__…__..I am afraid to die. I do not know if God sees me as he does the others, if I am as hideous to him as those who created me, what can I say to him when the time comes?__'__. _

_Smiling sadly,__ Vitorrio__ laid a hand on the other man__'__s shoulder, __'__all God needs from you, all he wishes for you, is truth. His love is unconditional, you need not question it, but you must face the truth of what you are; then you must set it aside, it is only in__ recognising__ this that you will find the peace you seek__'__. _

'_Thank you, Padre. I__…__.I think I understand__'__. _

'_This is not a bad world, my son__'__ the Priest said, __'__although I know it sometimes seems like that is so. We all serve God,__ honour__ him, in our own ways, he sees everything that we are and everything that we do. All that remains is for us to discover ourselves, and, in doing so, there is always the possibility for redemption__'__. _


	3. Chapter3

'So you won't accept the terms?'.

Diana Burnwood's voice was perfectly measured, as she always considered, and tailored, factors which might keep her from success. Her accent was one such alteration, from an early age she had consciously resisted any local influences; ensuring that while her tone was respectable, business-like, and feminine, it was also highly resistant to any and all attempts to pigeon-hole her.

Stephen Neal was also finding, to his cost, that it was a voice which could be as sharp and unpleasant as any other.

'I won't go after him, if that's what you mean' he replied, after a moment's loaded silence, 'nobody will'.

Letting out a disappointed sigh, Diana leant back in the chair, steepling her fingers, 'I expected better from you, Stephen. This is the first time I've known you to back down'.

Neal snorted, 'you're wasting your time, Diana. It's not a matter of pride, I'm simply not in his league'.

Closing her eyes, Diana pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger, massaging it lightly, 'he is just a _man_, Stephen. He sweats, he pisses, he snores and he _bleeds_. Merces Letifer has authorized me to offer you five million in a currency of _your_ choosing, can you honestly tell me you're going to walk away from that?'.

Audible breathing filled her ear-piece, she knew all too well the force which that amount of money exerted on people like Neal. If there was one thing she had learned since joining The Agency, it was that contract killers enjoyed living beyond their means. They wanted, no….._needed_ to stay in the most expensive hotels, bed the most beautiful women, drive the fastest car, opulence quickly became a drug to them, one they would do anything to sustain.

'I'm dead if I don't, goodbye Diana'.

_Click._

'Fuck' she swore quietly, the word a guilty admission as it was one that she made a point of never using in company.

Her cavernous office began to feel oppressively small, as though the walls were slowly drawing in, so she span her chair around to look out onto the New York skyline. Framed by a line of tall bay windows, with night just beginning to fall on the city, the view was magnificent. Lights snapped to life across the skyscrapers, always reminding her of phosphorescent moss glowing on the surface of huge, neglected tombstones, it seemed that no matter what stunning sight she saw now her mind could always find a macabre edge to it.

The buzzer on her desk sounded, she let it drone on for a moment before turning her attention to it, 'yes?'.

'There's a Mr Glass here to see you, Ma'am'.

Glass.

She drummed her fingers on the desk for a second, procrastinating, 'show him in'.

Jacob Glass entered the room a minute later, 'I trust I'm not disturbing you, Diana'.

If ever she had met anyone who was aptly named, then it was Glass. He possessed a thin, brittle body which, although well concealed by custom-made suits, seemed to consist entirely of sharp, bony edges. Thin, tapered hands, which looked more like those of a concert pianist, smoothed down his trousers before he sat.

The only thing which endeared Glass to others, and it was probably not through any conscious choice, was the ill-kempt haircut which he seemed to favour with every visit to a barber. Although his middle-parting was ordinary enough, the slightly too long style of the edges resulted in a pair of 'wings' which curved away from his temples, and, if caught by the slightest breeze, would bounce up and down as though trying to lift him into the sky.

_You needed things to laugh about in a business like this, _Diana thought grimly, _especially on a day like today._

'He's in New York' Jacob announced, relaying the news quickly as though doing so would somehow be less painful.

'Are you sure?' she asked.

He raised an eyebrow, 'Phillip Clausen is dead, along with an entire armed Special Forces team. I think that's a pretty strong indication'.

She nodded, trying to suppress the sudden fear which surged in her stomach, 'I contacted Neal'.

'And?'.

'I made the offer. He won't do it'.

'Disappointing, yet not entirely unexpected' Jacob said, scratching his stubble absent-mindedly, 'we may be forced to resort to more…..unorthodox methods'.

Her eyes thinned, boring into him like drills, 'meaning?'.

Glass stood, walking slowly over to the windows and clasping his hands behind his back, 'What would you be willing to do to eliminate Number 47, Diana?'.

She sneered, 'is this a trick question?'.

'I'm quite serious'.

'He's wiping us out one by one, eventually it will be my turn, then yours, we will all pay with our lives for the death of Vitorrio' she said irritably, 'no other assassin will hunt him, we can't find him. If any of us _want_ to stay alive then I'd say we should be willing to consider anything at this point'.

'Yet what of the lives of innocents?' he wondered aloud, 'how do you feel about those?'.

Diana was silent for a moment. While it could never have been claimed that she valued human life above all else, if only due to the nature of her work, she did feel some measure of relief in the fact that Merces Leifter did not employ trigger-happy cretins. Assassination was a precise art, one which was carried out on the corrupt Generals, the Mafia bosses, and the Terrorist leaders of the world, a scalpel which severed the head of a creature and, in turn, caused the body to wither and die.

Number 47 knew this more than anyone, and it had made others envious that she was chosen to be his Controller. It was rare to see people who took a genuine care in their work, who understood exactly what you wanted without needing to have the blanks filled in.

Who were perceptive enough to take life whilst comprehending the value of it.

'Are you suggesting an area-effect weapon?' she asked, 'a bomb?'.

'No. Although something perhaps equally as destructive' he said, 'what do you know of the work of the late Professor Ort-Meyer?'.

'I know it eventually killed him' Diana remarked dryly.

Glass gave a thin smile, 'we seized a significant amount of research and documents when the cleanup crew sterilized his lab. It was of no doubt a significant benefit to the field of cloning, but little use to us, however there was something else'.

He produced a small case from his suit pocket, inside was a disc which he slid into the drive of the large television set mounted in the left-hand wall of the office, 'what I am about to show you is classified, but……as you said, we really don't have time for that anymore'.

The display flicked on, and Diana leant forward in her seat.


	4. Chapter4

The refrigerated cabinet was crammed with brightly coloured bottles, slightly squashed pastries which were factory-wrapped, and stacks of processed cheese slices. He looked down at the contents in distaste, glancing across to the shelves and finding them similarly unappealing; all convenience goods, the only nod to fresh produce were some plastic cartons of milk, sitting uneasily between the milkshakes and chocolate drinks.

Cans of spray cheddar further offended, he shook his head and muttered, 'why is it so difficult to find edible cheese in this country?'.

47 took a moment to adjust his wig, tugging lightly at strands of artificial hair in the reflection of the cabinet door. The addition of a false moustache and beard had made him almost unrecognizable, but there were also a pair of sunglasses tucked into the top pocket of his short-sleeved shirt – just in case the disguise needed to be intensified unexpectedly.

He had used such covers many times in the past, and was widely versed in how to vary and maintain them, but it had never felt this strange and unnatural before. Despite all of Vitorrio's sermons on accepting himself, and not hiding behind a mask, he seemed perpetually cursed to speak with someone else's voice and walk in someone else's shoes.

_Nobody said you had to go back to this. Just__…__.easier to be the killer, isn__'__t it? To be the one in control, you know some part of you missed it when you were tending that garden._

'That's not who I am anymore' he murmured, suddenly all too aware of the weight of the S&W Chiefs Special in its boot holster.

Snatching a carton of milk from the cabinet, he moved efficiently through the store, loading up the basket with everything needed to create several passable meals.

The food couldn't be helped, despite the financial security he now possessed there was only one way to exist in the field when your opponent was as powerful and widespread as Merces Leifter; keep a low profile and strike from the shadows.

He had secured accommodation in the South Bronx, quietly depositing a number of weapons caches around the area whilst living in a state of relative poverty. It was tempting to move to a safer area, such as one of the outlying towns around New York, but his power currently existed in being among large numbers of people, and if the area was dangerous then Agency may be less likely to search there.

_Unless they managed to dig up more of your brothers._

47 grit his teeth, brushing the thought away, but it had been lingering in the back of his mind ever since he killed 17 in . The fact that he simply did not know how many others were out there was like a splinter buried in the side of his brain. It was bad enough that the decrepit, hated face of Ort-Meyer was blended into the one which he saw in the mirror each morning, but still worse was the devastating conclusion that he was not, and never would be, unique.

"It would be a very boring world if we were all alike" was a phrase he had often heard parroted by people to smooth disagreements and differences in opinion, but still the inaccuracy of it bothered him. Of course nobody _wanted_ to be a single piece on an assembly line, a formula gestated inside a computer, some might end up that way but they always had the choice.

No, a world in which we were all alike would be a very dangerous place, because at any one instant part of the hive can start believing itself to be the only _true_ individual, and everyone around it to be carbon copies – warranting nothing except deletion.

He had seen it in the eyes of 17, on the smug, superior expressions of the clones which Ort-Meyer set upon him in the Asylum; he was just another pretender to the crown, a flawed experiment to be disposed of, and they would remain as the one, perfect vision of their creator's work.


	5. Chapter5

'Watch this'.

Diana studied the monitor; there was a large, padded cell with soundproofed walls, unidentifiable streaks stained the floor, all sealed by a solid, metal door which was similarly cushioned. Her eyes were fixed on the individual which occupied it all, who was squatting, tense, like a cat about to leap on an unsuspecting bird and tear it to shreds.

He was naked, but his body muscular and toned enough for this not to be an immediate offence, rather it was the way he moved and the way he acted that both captivated and unnerved her. She remembered watching a television programme on feral children, offspring who were, for one reason or another, abandoned by their natural parents and raised by a pack of dogs or wolves.

Most had been rehabilitated, they learnt to function as part of the normal world, but a few were beyond help, more animal than human.

That's what she felt, watching this......man in the cell, _more animal than human_, even the clinically insane had some, vague air of humanity about them, but here she could see none of that.

As Glass had indicated, something was happening.

With a metallic _rasp_, a vent in the door was slid open and what looked to be about a dozen pieces of metal, of varying sizes, fell to the floor of the cell. The vent was closed and sealed with a speed born out of experience, and for a moment the parts lay like a silent invitation. Whipping his head round, the feral man bounded over to them, immediately setting to work.

Diana watched uneasily, rubbing at her right temple with two outstretched fingers, as the _shi-kik_ and _clak_ of metal against metal pitched out from the television's speakers. It continued for little over half a minute, during which time she felt she had never needed a cigarette more in her life, then the man turned round cradling something in his arms.

'My God' she murmured, 'that's....'.

'AK-47' Glass nodded, 'not that the weapon itself matters, we've tried him with all kinds of firearms; sniper-rifles, shotguns, pistols, grenade launchers, all perfectly assembled, ready to fire, and all done so in record time'.

She continued to stare at the screen as the man ran a constant, feverish hand up and down the assault rifle, nodding to himself as though content with what had been achieved.

Icy fingers crept up and down her spine, it took a second to compose herself, she turned to Glass 'alright, you've got my attention. Now explain'.

He thumbed a button on the remote control and the image flicked into nothingness, 'gladly'.

Glass returned to the seat across from her, giving a small cough before he spoke, 'We've nicknamed him Number 1. He was discovered in a cell, far less luxurious than the one he currently occupies, when the cleanup crew were sent to sterilize Ort-Meyer's lab. 1 killed two of them before they managed to subdue him, it took rather a prolonged beating to render him unconscious, we believe that may be something to do with his adrenal gland, which-...'.

Diana held up a hand, stopping him, 'let me get this straight. You intend to use this......._thing_, as a weapon?'.

He gave an amused frown, 'would you prefer we grant him a position in the Cafeteria?'.

'Don't patronize me, you prick!' she snapped, rising quickly and slamming her fists down on the desk, 'you act as though this were just an ordinary assassin, one which obeys........_rules_, regulations, this......this..._thing_, is a failed _experiment!'. _

Glass fidgeted, straightening his tie with wandering hands, trying to act as though these gestures were not a result of his own nervousness. 'You wanted options, I gave them to you. Well, you know what? This is the _last one'_ he spluttered, face reddening in anger with each new word.

'Jesus Christ Diana, you think there's going to be a _clean_ solution to what we've started here?' he asked in disbelief, '17 was it, but he failed, we took a gamble, and it _failed_, you can't patch those kinds of holes cleanly. 1 may be dangerous but in case you hadn't noticed so is the man who is coming to kill you!'.

Pumped up by adrenaline, Glass remained standing for a second, unaware he'd even rose to his feet, before slumping back into the seat, exhausted.

Diana sat back down slowly, her right hand going immediately to a desk drawer and coming out holding a packet of Marlboros. She didn't like the others to know that she smoked, even she had always considered it a sign of weakness, of giving into pleasure over reason, and so far she had managed to keep it a secret.

All those furtive times spent blowing smoke out of the window like a frightened teenager, of secreting an anti-tobacco air freshener in her office, of even bringing in a spare change of clothes in case she had an unexpected meeting...._'It's a little embarrassing, I just spilt coffee on the others, since you ask'....._in case they happened to give off that immediately familiar, stale odour.

Three years of dancing around it, being so careful, and now she was lighting up in front of Jacob Glass, a supposed equal, just because she could not continue to function without one _right now_.

Clogging her senses with nicotine, Diana sat there in silence for several minutes while Glass waited politely, attempting to relieve his awkwardness by both dusting off his suit and looking around the office as though it was the first time he'd visited.

'Can...' she said finally, and his attention snapped to her, 'can we control him?'.

Sighing, he mulled the question over for a time before replying; 'we all know that 47 was one of the last works of Ort-Meyer, but what we never considered before, we never really had to, was what came before him. There's a massive difference between the perfect _killer_ and the perfect _assassin_, interestingly it seems that Meyer's early experiments revolved around creating the perfect killer, a prototype if you will'.

Diana nodded, 'then he built on that'.

'Exactly. All of the pre-requisites of the perfect assassin; clarity of thought, lack of emotional attachment, precision, patience, these were all added in later incarnations of the clones, they took what Meyer had created in 1.....harnessed it, controlled it. It's much like comparing modern day man to a Neanderthal, we are, in some ways, very much the same, but different in every manner which we would consider important'.

'So, the answer is no' she concluded, tapping the hill of ash from her cigarette onto the plush carpeting.

'1 derives an enormous amount of pleasure from murder' Glass swallowed, as though he had witnessed such an act personally, 'it seems Ort-Meyer took the motto "be happy in your work" a little too literally, once again....only later did he think to remove the vast majority of emotional responses altogether, the logic being why would you miss the experience of pleasure if you had never felt it before?'.

Diana blew twin funnels of smoke from her nostrils, 'so we don't brief him, we don't instruct him, we just.......aim him'.

Glass nodded, blinking rapidly as the gray-blue cloud washed over him, 'correct. We can take precautions, of course, to keep ourselves out of his way, but 1 will not accept authority of any kind......perhaps he responded to Ort-Meyer but that point is moot now'.

'Why keep him alive?' she wondered aloud, 'why was he the only failure to survive?'.

'Impossible to say' Glass responded eventually, 'maybe Meyer felt he could continue to learn from the mistakes he made with 1, maybe he was just overly sentimental about his first clone, we don't know'.

'Providing we _do_ use him, and he _does_ succeed' she said, studying the burning end of the cigarette absently, 'how would we then...contain him?'.

'When I asked you earlier about innocent life' Glass responded, 'I was referring not only to civilians, which 1 _will_ kill, but Police as well. We managed to secure footage of 47 when he eliminated Phillip Clausen, knowing that 47's modus operandi has always been to cut power to surveillance and security systems we planted a camera on Clausen, it got us all the shots we need'.

'So you're going to set the Police after 47?' she asked, puzzled, 'they won't stand a chance'.

'Not quite. If 1 does succeed in erasing our....mutual problem, then the Police will be left with the task of erasing him. As 1 and 47 are, for all intents and purposes, genetically identical, they will believe that 1 is the killer we captured on film'.

'What of the corpse of 47?'.

Glass coughed, 'we have a controlling interest in the Coroner's office, he will substitute an appropriate cadaver'.

'You seem to have it all worked out' she muttered, her tone a blend of admiration and loathing.

Glass rose to leave, smoothing down his trousers, 'I already have the approval of our Section head Peter Aubrey. As you know, we require three signatures of controlling rank to undertake a decision of this magnitude, needless to say I have signed...'.

'I'll think about it' Diana cut him off gruffly, not looking up.

'Of course. I've left the appropriate documentation with your Secretary, for the order to be effective we must proceed within the next eight hours. Now, if you'll excuse me, there are some last minute details to check over'.

He left without another word, only when the large, double-doors had _clicked_ closed did Diana clumsily stub out her cigarette on a nearby stack of blotter paper. She lit another with numb, robotic motions, then, reluctantly, picked up the remote control and thumbed it on.

1 was staring up at the video camera as though it were a coiled snake about to strike, his teeth were bared and a long, thin string of saliva hung from his bottom lip. His eyes were so empty and soulless they may as well have been two slices of painted glass, he _was_ a killer in the purest sense of the word; no conscience, sense of remorse, needing no motive to take a life.

Two locks had been opened and now the key to the third lay with her, it was a responsibility which made the bourbon from her drinks cabinet taste like water, and the cigarette smoke settle on her lungs like ashes from a funeral urn.


	6. Chapter6

'Mr Ableman! How good it is to see you again!'.

47 turned and nodded a greeting to the man hurrying down the stairs toward him, his instinctive reaction was to adopt a defensive posture but, with some effort, he ignored it.

He had only met Mr Kurzweil twice, but evidently the squat, harassed landlord had found this particular tennant to be such a pleasant change to his usual occupants that he insisted on greeting the assassin like a long lost friend.

Kurzweil was not a stereotypical slum-lord, it seemed, the deep lines on his forehead had been etched by constant worry, his red-rimmed eyes by more than a handful of late nights. During an earlier conversation, he explained how he had never intended to be responsible for this particular block; rather the apartments themselves had been owned by his father and willed to him when the old man passed away, guilt at such an unexpected inheritance had obviously driven him to this unpleasant job, although he never admitted as much out loud.

It would have been so easy to give Kurzweil the money he needed to restore and repair this building, to try and grant his life some semblance of peace, but such charity wasn't a concept 47 was comfortable with anymore. He remembered the small, lingering satisfaction which stayed with him when the church gladly accepted his huge donation, but the money was soaked in blood and seemed to bring suffering to whoever else touched it.

Who was to say that The Agency didn't use those exact means to track him to Sicily? They certainly had the technology, how easy would it have been to monitor such donations, to lead them to Vittorio?

No, the money _always_ left a trail, and as long as that trail led directly to him then no-one else need suffer because of it.

'Mr Kurzweil' he replied, 'how are you?'.

The slum-lord pulled a long suffering expression, managing to tinge it with just enough humour so that the desperation didn't show through, 'Oy.....I know a man such as yourself understands the responsibility of big business! Waste management, wasn't it? A shrewd profession Mr Ableman, that is where the money lies now....in dealing with the problems we have created for ourselves!'

'It can be quite profitable' 47 agreed, 'although I seldom meet many pleasant people'.

Kurzweil held up his hands, rolling his eyes in synch with the gesture, 'tell me about it! I suppose you could say.....'.

He leaned closer, looking around furtively as if afraid of being overheard, 'I suppose you could say I deal in a type of waste management myself!'.

As though someone had secretly overheard this, Kurzweil then grimaced, 'oh......no, I really shouldn't say that. What a superior schmuck! There _are_ good people here, but they are sandwiched between the drug addicts and the prostitutes, the pimps, the dealers, I do what I can to keep them out but then......this is not exactly the Ritz, you know?'.

47 nodded, all too aware that Kurzweil was perhaps not the best person to practise the act of smalltalk on, the poor man could have spoken for hours with little encouragement.

'Mr Kurzweil' he interrupted, 'sorry, but there is something I must discuss with you'.

Withdrawing a thick, plain brown envelope from his jacket, 47 held it out for the other man to take 'I may have to leave abruptly on important business, but the schedule is not yet finalized. This envelope contains the next two weeks rent, and a small amount to compensate you for the damage to the floor'.

'No, my friend! No no!' Kurzweil gesticulated, 'the wood was rotten, it was no fault of your own'.

'I won't hear of it. Please, I insist'.

Sighing, the slum-lord scratched at one of his huge, puffy eyebrows and accepted the envelope, 'if only all my tennants were as considerate'.


	7. Chapter 7

The S&W Chiefs Special was in his hands five seconds after he saw the apartment door was ajar.

47 set his grocery bags down quietly, pressing his body weight lightly against the door, peering through the gap to check that at least one half of the room was unoccupied. Securing a firm grip on the handle, he pushed it fully open while shifting down into a crouch, using the door knob as a support to swing the right half of his body; one gun-arm outstretched, one eye, and one knee into visibility whilst maintaining the cover.

He drew a bead on the figure, then eased his finger off the trigger and stood, 'I hope you still think it's funny when I really _do_ shoot you one day, Smith'.

Gathering up the grocery bags, he brought them inside and closed the door, locking it.

Agent Smith stood inside what passed for a kitchen in the hovel, his grin a direct, knowing comparison to 47's emotionless expression, 'nice place, I bet even you couldn't handle the roaches in here'.

'They just got a whole lot bigger' 47 said, re-holstering the S&W, 'did anyone follow you here?'.

Smith adopted an expression of mock pain, 'they do teach us _some_ skills in the C.I.A you know. Although even someone with unarmed combat and weapons training only visits the South Bronx if they're suicidal'.

47 grunted, moving around Smith and starting to unpack the groceries, 'you brought the files?'.

'I like the hair' the agent remarked, 'not sure about the beard though, or the new name. Charon Ableman? What the hell is that?'.

'Gallows humour, mostly' 47 mused, 'Charon was the boatman of the River Styx, ferried souls to the afterlife'.

'Do you sit down and think these up or do they just come to you? Because, I'm starting to worry'.

'My signature was far too easy to fake when it just read "47"' the assassin said wryly, 'do you have the files?'.

'Yeah yeah, they're right here. Of course you know they don't really exist'.

'Of course. And neither do you for the duration of this visit, which is an arrangement I find infinitely rewarding'.

Taking the folder, 47 retreated to a sofa on which springs threatened to burst through from any point at any moment, 'so, unofficially, how many section heads of Agency do I have to kill before the C.I.A _doesn't _approve?'.

Smith followed him in, sipping at a styrofoam cup of coffee, 'I can't speak for my superiors. Our….unofficial partnership with Agency always served our interests until they put us in a very awkward position by siding with Sergi, to give that man the services of an, at least in part, _American_ based organization was plainly unacceptable'.

47 opened the file and began leafing through its contents, 'yet your hands were tied when it came to taking a reprisal action. To do so, even covertly, could make a dangerous enemy. One with enough expertise and muscle to not only make things uncomfortable for you overseas, but domestically as well'.

'You see, this is the part where I do the "friend" thing' Smith said uneasily, sitting down in a battered armchair and setting his cup on the table.

The assassin flipped the folder closed, raising an eyebrow, 'we're friends?'.

For a moment Smith's expression seemed to collapse, but he quickly found the practised smile again, 'sure we are. I mean, I know you don't really know me and….I don't really know you, but that's the nature of our work, right?'.

Both men regarded each other quietly for a second, both similarly unnerved but for quite different reasons. 47 didn't trust how jittery Smith had become, he seemed to have developed a facial tic and was too highly strung for a field operative, there was the sense of something about to snap.

Smith didn't trust 47's complete lack of emotional response, it was a state he had been trained to enter when suffering torture but this assassin existed in it perpetually, there was a very unnatural air about the man; he was seemingly uncomplicated yet incredibly difficult to read, single-minded but with the threat of a dozen invisible interests.

'It can certainly be that way' the assassin replied.

'Look man, all I'm trying to say is this' the Agent said, 'I may work for a big fish but that doesn't necessarily mean I agree with them, or that _I_ want to manipulate you. I know about Father Vitorrio, I know why you want Diana Burnwood's head on a stick, but are you sure this is what the old man would've wanted. I mean, weren't you trying to get _away_ from all of this?'.

47 stared down at the folder for what seemed like a long time, then back up at Smith. 'I've asked myself the same question' he admitted, 'how am I honoring the memory of Vitorrio by committing acts he would abhor? But the Padre said to me once "you must face the truth of what you are", and I have. This is what I am, a killer, plain and simple, without a target, without a gun in my hand, I'm nothing, defunct, useless'.

'There's always another way' Smith said firmly, 'you give into this now and it _will_ swallow you whole. You'll drift into the arms of another firm like Agency, become their tool, and Vitorrio's words will mean as little as some throwaway fortune cookie bullshit'.

'I think you should leave now' 47 said, 'I'll destroy the files when I'm finished, as always'.

Smith sat prone, as though he was about to speak again, then stood and moved straight towards the door. 'Look man, I don't know much. As an agent…..I'm godawful. You know that, you've pulled my ass out of the fire enough times. But I do know this…..once you kill Burnwood and the others, once Vitorrio is avenged, you won't stop. You never will. You won't even try'.

The door slammed behind him, leaving only the still steaming cup of coffee as evidence that Smith had ever visited. 47 sat motionless, using the agent's final words like a dagger to stab himself repeatedly with, trying to feel the sting of each and every new wound _'You won't stop. You never will. You won't even try'. _

Nothing.

Reaching over, he picked up the styrofoam cup and poured its contents over his right hand.

That, at least, triggered a response, and for as long as the pain lasted, he savoured it.


	8. Chapter 8

'Do they hurt?'.

The woman slowly traced her finger down the scars, brushing over a short curve of bullet wounds, and continued sliding her hand until it wrapped around the man's waist. There was no softness there, not even the smallest indication of fat, it was like gripping stone made flesh.

Stephen Neal took a deep, appreciative breath.

Her perfume, the smell of her sweat, of her hair enveloping his right arm, was intoxicating. Every time he was surrounded by death, every time he measured the moments in horrible, drawn-out seconds, this was the odour that he clinged to, that he promised himself in order to summon the will to make it out alive.

'They used to' he replied, 'I guess I don't think about it anymore'.

'_Not even when you look in the mirror?' _she thought, the consideration causing her to kiss his neck as though out of unspoken sympathy.

Neal lightly caressed her arm, marvelling at how smooth and unspoiled it was compared to his own weathered skin, and enjoyed a silence which held no expectations for him.

_No expectations of the right moment to pull the trigger, of dreading that the man with his back to you will, suddenly, somehow know you are there. Just waiting without a goal, without…expectation._

This was as relaxed as he ever became, but still there was a tight, hard kernel of tension in his chest, one which was ever present. It would be wrong to resent it, as constant readiness had saved his life more than once, had assured he became one of the best in the field, but by the same token it meant he was never truly _with_ Maria; some other part of him was always planning, always considering the fastest way to leave a room or the most dangerous makeshift weapon in it, that was the curse of the path he had chosen.

Uncoiling her arm from his chest, he turned and drank in the sight of her.

At first he had tried to establish meaningful relationships despite the nature of his work, but painful experience had shown that he could not share enough of his life to any potential partner's satisfaction.

Mercenary, he knew the implications of the word.

The implications of asking someone to wait for him, knowing that he was placing himself in danger every time he left. Not the selfless jeopardy which a Police Officer or Fireman steps into, knowing it is part and parcel of their work, but rather one brought about solely by the pursuit of money.

Neal had realised early on that he was never suited for helping others, the kernel of self-preservation had developed for a good reason, if you only relied on yourself then you didn't have to go far for the cause when something went wrong. Such cynicism burdened him, in the beginning, but after a while it was easier to see the vast majority of people as sheep, mindlessly following a rigid series of events straight to their graves, what did it matter if he just delivered them there a little earlier than expected?

Maria looked back at him, unnerved by the intensity of his stare, but said nothing and managed to summon up a smile. She was beautiful, by anyone's standards; curly black hair framed a face which had inherited all the best parts of Mediterranean heritage, her skin was flawless and browned as if lightly tanned, large olive green eyes exuded both innocence and some measure of experience, her nose was little more than an inoffensive impression, and the lips beneath shone as if constantly wet.

Such beauty came at a price, of course, but for Neal her company was worth every cent.

'You okay, baby?' she asked softly, just the hint of a Spanish accent filtering through, 'you're making me feel kind of funny'.

Neal suddenly became aware of how he was staring, and looked away, shaking his head, 'sorry, I just…..something on my mind'.

He turned back to face across the room, letting out a groan as Maria began to massage his shoulders, 'you want to talk about it?'.

'Friend of mine' he said eventually, 'I think he's in trouble'.

She kneaded the muscles under her palms, stretching out her thumbs and rubbing them in circular motions. Neal resigned himself to it for a moment, closing his eyes and letting the sensations wash over him.

'I didn't know you had any friends' she wondered, not unkindly.

'I don't' he admitted, 'we met a while back, I hadn't even thought about him for a few years until someone called me the other day. He wasn't the kind of person you kept in contact with but I…….respected him, you know?'.

Maria gave a small moan which was either agreement or exagerrated pleasure at manipulating his muscles, it probably didn't matter either way.

'The kind of person you could depend on' Neal said, 'I promised if he ever needed my help then he had it, but…things are more complicated now'.

'They _always_ are, honey' Maria said, 'for all of us'.

'I guess so' Neal agreed, 'but where does that leave me?'.

'Utterly helpless' she intoned with a mock-seriousness, 'so just lie back and enjoy it'.


	9. Chapter 9

The machine rose in tempo, whirring out a steady rhythm, as it met the demands of another new setting. Neal's eyes were locked on the wall, almost as if challenging it to come alive and attack him, while his arms pumped and feet thundered across the rubber conveyer.

He ran bare-foot, had for the past seven years. Soles like sun-baked leather and hardened callouses attested to that, you couldn't rely on a stout pair of combat boots to carry you those last few miles, when it came down to it there were very few things you could rely on in the field. There was a time when he hadn't thought this way, when slipping on a kevlar vest and holstering a Glock 9mm felt almost romantic, invincible, but those moments were long since past.

_Nearly took you with them though, didn__'__t they?_

Grunting, Neal thumbed the treadmill up another level and re-focussed, but his memories, the quiet shame, had already gained too much ground. Sometimes he would train with such violent energy that anyone watching would have sworn this man was psychotic, but there was no irrationality to his actions, to Neal he was simply responding in the only way he knew how.

Muscle could be built, tendons could be firmed, yet emotions were another thing entirely. He hated them, so fluid and slippery, rats which scuttled out of the woodwork then ran back to where it was impossible to pursue when you went after them. The one thing which had carried him through so many workouts, through so much residual pain, was the thought of building his body to the extent that it bore down on and squeezed the life out of his weaknesses; vermin could only live in the unfilled cracks, the spaces between walls, he would build up his structure to such an extent that those places no longer existed.

_Will you take out your brain and keep it in a jar too? Idiot._

'Whatever it takes' he muttered, 'choke you with muscle, drown you in adrenaline, whatever it takes'.

With a soft _beep_ the treadmill started to ease back, he looked down at the display in mild confusion to see an hour had passed. No matter how many times Neal lost track of time, on a mission or with Maria, it never ceased to amaze him how perception could alter the flow of the world around you. It was frightening, although he would never have admitted that; the way that he lost stacks, heaped piles of minutes, arguing with his emotions like someone sparring in a ring with an inexhaustable opponent, while his body simply carried on and completed whatever it was engaged in.

Stepping off the conveyer, he took a long slug of water and used a worn towel to pat his face dry. Even now he still felt a buzz from such exercise, an aching pressure, as though a hand had encircled his body and was squeezing with warm pulses.

Sunlight was slicing underneath the venetian blind now, so he strode across to the plastic wand and twisted it, angling the slats upward. It showed every sign of being a beautiful day, there were no skyscrapers boxing him in, just Central Park below which looked every bit as lush and inviting as Eden choking under industry could.

Neal stood for a moment enjoying the thin beams of light which touched his skin, attaching a dollar value to every soothing second. This apartment was expensive, property on the Upper East Side was perpetually in demand, and marrying location with actually desirable living space could hurt anyone's bank balance.

He needed it, though. God did he need it.

Too many times the city felt like a laboratory maze, walled in by these colossal buildings on all sides, marinating in a blend of exhaust fumes and sour sweat. This view, this…illusion of space, was the only way Neal could stand it, sometimes he wanted to leave, head for the country, but the convenience of living in such a well connected hub was too good to give up.

_If you__'__re so well connected, don__'__t you think it__'__s time to find out just what__'__s going on? Exactly what he__'__s done?_

Giving an almost imperceptible shake of his head, Neal threw down his towel and squared up in front of the punchbag. Easing into a series of light strikes, he shifted and weaved around the apparatus, avoiding imaginary blows hurled back in his direction. His punches quickly became hard enough to rock and rattle the equipment on it's heavy metal struts, sending the punchbag swinging violently as Neal slammed a roundhouse kick into the sand filled body.

Pivoting on his heel, he rammed an elbow into the ribs of the bag then span and drove the same point into it's right temple. Whipping back, his fist became an open palm, fingers curled and heel protruding. He slammed the blunt extension of his arm into the bag's sternum, then whipped the limb upward to crack his foe's nasal cartilidge and drive it into their brain.

_You owe him that much._

More often that not he hated that voice; always reminding him of past failures or looming responsibilities, it was a joyless and spiteful thing. Yet, he also knew when it spoke the truth, when the words caused something inside him to resonate like a tuning fork.

That was when he hated it the most.


	10. Chapter 10

_To say the scream awoke him would be incorrect. He didn't sleep; at least not as most people understood it. There were no dreams which had ever been remembered, no hours of welcome oblivion, just a shallow relaxation in which his mind filtered through each and every sound that occurred while the body lay dormant. _

_Within seconds he was by the window, pistol in hand, heart pumping as smoothly and slowly as it ever had before._

_The same, horrible sound pierced the air again, sounding every bit like the shriek of some lost, alien creature bellowing in despair and pain at the unfamiliar world it now found itself in. More fanciful and pliant minds might have gone with the image; envisaging the smoldering crater from which a mottled gray and pink thing had crawled, leaving trails of pungent green blood behind it, mouth a writhing mass of tentacles as it howled out each new cry._

_Such imagination was, in itself, an alien being to 47._

_It wasn't that he never drew on such a pool of creativity, but rather that childhood fantasies had been bypassed completely. There were few frightening unknowns in the world, and none of them could be attributed to paranormal influences, he already knew first-hand that what geneticists were capable of creating was a rival to any nightmarish creature film or fear could conjure up._

_Dressing quickly, he opened the small cabin door and stepped outside._

_There was no breeze tonight, tourists would bemoan that this was not air meant for breathing, while others might marvel in the fantastic stillness of the night. The sky was unclouded, giving the moon free reign to cast everything in a cold, glacial glow. It was as though no foreign movement or sound was permitted, which made the scream all the more alarming as it broke such unspoken rules to make itself heard over and over._

_He traced it quickly to the pig-pen at the far end of the yard; one of the Sows was lying on its side in a pool of blood, bawling in pain and confusion. 47 vaulted the fence, kneeling as he ran a hand up and down the animal, searching for injuries._

'_What is it?' came a voice from the Church, 'what's the matter?'. _

_Father Vittorio had started down the large, stone stairwell, his labored approach giving 47 ample time to tuck the Glock 17 into the waistband of his trousers and tug the slack of his T-shirt out over it. _

_He was uncomfortable with the presence of the weapon, if only because holding it again had reminded him just how much the pistol felt like a natural, welcome extension of his own body. He wanted to believe that these months spent ignoring his programmed desires would somehow cause them to lose strength, that the next time he handled a firearm it would say nothing to him, yet it was now obvious how painfully naïve that belief had been._

_The old man drew up beside him, 'I heard the cries from inside, what a miserable sound! Is there anything we can do for her?'._

_47 could see that the pig was beyond help; some hungry predator, probably a stray dog, had ripped pieces out of the Gilt's neck and belly. Blood boiled up from deep teeth and claw wounds, looking like a wash of black ink in the moonlight, 'she's lost too much blood' he said, 'there's nothing we can do'. _

_The animal let out another long, mewling cry, trotters scratching against the wet earth beneath as though trying to dig up the vital fluid which had already soaked down into it._

'_There is one thing we can do' the Father said, his voice tinged with regret, 'end her suffering'. _

_Such a command would have been obeyed without question in the past, as easily on a human as it was on an animal, but 47 drew in a breath even as he felt the cold steel of the Glock against his skin. 'I cannot, I will not'. _

_Vittorio seemed to recognise the words, not as a defiant refusal but rather a quiet pleading, and laid a hand on the other man's shoulder. 'You have told me little of your past, but this is fine as I never wished to know. I can tell that you have seen much suffering, too much for your memories to bear, but you came here to stand with me in the presence of something greater – so I will tell you about this. _

'_This animal is one of God's creatures' he continued, 'he would not see it suffer needlessly any more than he would wish for us to wage war in his name, while he is loving of all creations he is also merciful. Become his hand, deliver this Gilt again to his side, and you will not be judged for it'. _

'_I will judge myself' 47 said, shaking his head, 'power over other life is not mine to wield, it never was. Tyrants justify themselves in terms of mercy and loving guidance, yet all they desire is the power to take and save life'. _

'_Yes' Vittorio sighed, 'but I know that you are no such false God, the fact that you are questioning this act proves it. I would release you of the responsibility, as I can see it causes you much pain, but I no longer have the strength. You are my hand as much as his, the strong aiding the weak'. _

'_I....'. _

'_Become his hand, my son'. _

_Letting go, 47 allowed the genes within him to guide his hands, he gripped either side of the Gilt's head and wrenched it violently to the side. The animal crumpled back to the earth, tongue lolling from its mouth, and screamed no more._

_After that there was a sudden madness, one which he had to close his eyes and clench his fists to bring under control, rolling through him like an acidic tidal wave. It told him to draw the Glock and empty its clip into the Priest, to kill the man who had forced him to utilize these skills again, because all at once he was reminded what it felt like to be the tyrant._


	11. Chapter 11

Who am I?

It is a question which everyone asks at least once in their lives; facing self-doubt and growing concern over their future, unpleasant deliberations over the events of their past. Somewhere between the media-induced desires and frustrated dreams of being someone and/or achieving something fantastic, they find not an answer but enough truth to be able to carry on.

That is the way for most, but there also exist those who never needed to ask the question.

47 sat cross-legged in front of a cotton blanket laid out on the floor, his pose almost meditative, spread across the material were a number of disassembled firearms. Vivaldi's Four Seasons played from a small, portable stereo stood on the kitchen work-surface, a work which Father Vittorio had always found intensely moving and capable of, in an instant, restoring his faith in the goodness of mankind.

Above the music, shouts from lower apartments could occasionally be heard; slamming doors, a child crying, offensively loud rap music which seemed to resonate through every strut and plank of the building as though it had become one giant amplifier. 47 could easily shut out such distractions, he was capable of focusing on one task with such intensity that the world around him simply dropped away, but this was also another pre-programmed impulse he sought to override.

Even though the noises surrounding him were those of frustration, anger, and bitterness, he could feel the life in them just the same. It was a constant source of fascination, the study of such emotions and the situations that stirred them in others, one which he threw himself into so completely it threatened to overwhelm his current mission.

The assault rifle parts had been sitting on the fabric for over three hours now, he was capable of assembling them in less than twenty minutes but instead had chosen to ignore the weapons. Now he existed in a kind of trance, melding the soothing rhythms of Vivaldi with the endless vitriol which existed in this near-derelict apartment block, trying to slot the two together like mismatched jigsaw pieces.

If there was some profound meaning in them existing together, laid atop each other, then he had yet to find it. He came at the subject from all angles, but his approaches were all logical ones, rational to a fault, hence this attempt to turn himself over to some deeper instinct, one buried beneath the genetic programming, the soul others were so certain existed.

_I am a man. They can manipulate my genetical makeup, tweak and bestow certain impulses, reinforce others, but they cannot take my soul away from me, that is beyond even their abilities._

He closed his eyes, clenching his fists until hot pulses of pain spread up his arms, trying to disengage that perpetual throb which could power his fight or retreat in a split-second, which it just waited for, _longed_ to power.

The resource seemed to be infinite, despite his extreme efforts to cripple it through exhaustion. He had once taken to the streets, dressed like any ordinary jogger, but unlike them he had run for over fifty miles, so the pedometer he had clipped to his waistband told him later. No set route, just the burning desire to drive that energy to breaking point.

It rose to meet his demands, granting a new, dismaying stamina, the more he pushed it the more it gave, almost spitefully.

Eventually his body had to give out, and it did, bowing out the legs from beneath him and sending him crumpling to the concrete. Even as a small group gathered around this jogger, one asking him if he was alright while others stood paralyzed by that strange desire neither to assist nor leave, he could still feel the energy.

It knew his body had nothing left to give, but it was _still_ there; throbbing away like the engine of a car with tyres slashed, windscreen smashed, and chassis dented savagely inwards by sledgehammer blows.

Something close to despair came upon him, he didn't think it would be anything nearly as intense as others felt, a mere splinter to their emotional wounds, but it was there. Even as someone helped him to his feet, he could already feel those resentful words bubbling up in his throat, a reply to the question he knew would in seconds come again.

'I'm fine. It's alright, I'm fine'.

He caught a taxi back to his apartment and slumped into the armchair, in one hand was a Colt AMT Hardballer pistol, one of his signature firearms. It was a reliable weapon, but not one he had any particular liking for. The Dual Hardballers were only a means to creating a legend; nobody could fire dual pistols with any degree of accuracy outside the movies, only an amateur would even attempt such a thing, yet 47 hit the mark every time, with a pistol which had a kickback so strong it could snap your wrist.

That thought alone drove him to press the barrel to his right temple, cock the hammer, but he knew he could never do it.

Suicide simply didn't make any sense to his logical mind; he desired to leave this existence but it was almost as though, without extremes of emotion, he could not formulate a convincing enough argument to allow himself to pull the trigger.

Perhaps that was another of their genetic safeguards.

As his thoughts wandered, the CD reached its final track, breaking his reverie in an instant.

Knocking.

Someone was knocking.

47 looked up, first puzzled as to how long the person had been rapping their knuckles against the door, how he could have tuned it out, then buoyed by a feeling of strange optimism that perhaps he was capable of such a thing. He stood and stretched, 'who is it?'.

'It's Mr Kurzweil, my friend. I hope I'm not disturbing you'.

'Not at all. One moment please'.

He instinctively reached for the Glock 17 lying next to the stereo, hesitating before his hand closed around it.

Another pre-programmed response, he had to start noticing and eliminating them, one by one.

Some part of him voiced a silent disagreement; he was a man in hiding, a wanted murderer, he could not let his guard down for a single moment.

47 retracted his hand and defiantly curled it into a fist.

The argument was sound, of course. He had no doubt it would feel that way because he had been listening to that prudent, cautious voice his entire life, and its reasoning would only become more beguiling, fighting for survival as he sought to do away with it entirely.

Leaving the pistol, he walked to the door, unlocked and opened it.

He had only a moment to take in the sight before him; the squat landlord with wide, frightened eyes and a forehead sheathed in sweat. The man behind with a hand clamped around his neck like Kurzweil were a wild bird he was about to throttle, the huge deranged smile, and that face.

_That face._

Before 47 could react, his clone brother hurled Kurzweil through the doorway, slamming the helpless man into him. He somehow kept his balance, the landlord toppling away, but barely had time to raise his fists before 1 was upon him.

Even as 47 began to fight for his life - recalling martial arts, melee strategy, and unarmed combat techniques with nearly mathematical precision, there was still part of him that kept thinking of the face, seeing it in a frozen moment and asking that same question over and over.

Who am I?


	12. Chapter 12

Everyone has a rhythm.

One which they follow in their everyday lives; one which dictates their actions or lack thereof, one which decides their tastes in art, literature, sexual interests, determines the places and people they are drawn to, and those things which repel them as surely as poison.

Fighting is no different.

You concentrate not on your own blows, your own movement, but in tying yourself to the rhythm of the enemy, synchronizing yourself with them as though you were two minds in the same body. If you can't determine what fuels the person behind the hail of fists, what they communicate with every blow, then you'd best hope they don't know it either.

For the first time in his life, 47 didn't know his foe.

There was no rhythm; just a knotted ball of strikes, punches, claws and kicks which somehow co-existed together, a demented conga-line of moves which burrowed into and over each other. He had fought those before who were almost wild animals; possessed of enormous strength and speed, but this was more like combating an alien – a creature with some huge, foreign set of principles which simply didn't conform to any known style or rule.

Chaos.

47 slipped easily past his foe's lack of measured defence and slammed home blows which would have felled any normal man, yet he may as well have been striking a bobo doll which just rolled right back into every hit. Driving his knee up into 1's stomach, he then stabbed the point of his elbow between the top vertebrae of the other man's spine. It was a move designed to incapacitate, sending such sudden and dark waves of pain into the mind that it simply blacked out.

Even though he had yet to consciously acknowledge it, 47 wanted to avoid killing the clone if at all possible. The cycle had to end somewhere, he needed to start learning from his brothers before there were none left, he had to make them understand.

1's mouth jerked open, sending out streamers of saliva when the blow struck home, but he didn't fall. In fact, with an impossible resilience, he was already straightening up. 47 pivoted, the edge of his foot snapping 1's head round whiplash fast with an audible _crack, _'This is madness, we can't keep killing each other!'.

The clone staggered back, his breathing coming in rapid blasts.

_Good, I hurt him._

It was only when 1 looked up that 47 realized how wrong he was, the killer's mouth split into a wide, bloody grin and he quivered as though someone had lanced him with an electric cable. Insane, shrieking laughter ripped through the apartment, bringing 47's mind to the past with a horrible clarity.

He remembered that sound, what was worse he remembered Ort-Meyer's explanation of it when the cackling reached the two of them. It was during one of his etiquette lessons; mathematics, languages, geography, history, they had all been fed to him via subliminal means, but it seemed that social nuances were an area that Meyer would rather cover himself.

Sat there at opposite ends of a huge, oak table draped with white cloth; covered with a number of silver platters on which food steamed invitingly and filled the room with wonderful aromas, ornate cutlery laid out as precisely as an assassin's tools during the selection process, the two men could have passed for father and son.

Meyer was watching 47 eat, hands bunched together in an arthritic cluster on the table, when the laughter echoed through the corridors.

His son was too well trained to pay obvious attention to the noise, that would have been most impolite whilst dining at another's residence, but Meyer knew his curiosity well enough.

'A father holds much responsibility, as well you know' he said, 'but that responsibility does not only extend to his most favored sons, the ones who he will be proud to send out into the world'.

47 sipped Chardonnay and gave a slight nod, he could tell by the tone that there was more to come.

'Each of us makes mistakes' Meyer said, his voice carrying no regret but rather a simple statement of fact, 'logic dictates that we never forget these mistakes, we learn from them, and in doing so we become stronger for the future'.

47 dabbed his mouth with a nearby napkin, 'all life hinges on the same concept'.

Meyer smiled, 'precisely, my son. I have much pride in you, but I also have pride in my mistakes. I see each of them as the desire to achieve, to create something greater than myself, and so I do not erase them as one would wipe clean an incorrectly penciled equation'.

His creation considered this for a moment, 'some of my brothers are mistakes?'.

'You are my only perfect son' Meyer nodded, 'The others…'.

He leant back in his chair, musing, 'some are brilliant, possessed of great intellects which could add much to civilization, yet they are trapped within psychotic shells – two forces forever battling for dominance of the psyche. Their very existence is painful, and I deeply regret that pain, but someday they will be as admired and held in just as much awe as you will be. They are all part of you, and you of them, and you will _all_ have your time to shine'.

The conversation ended there, 47 never heard the cackling again after that night but it forever lingered in his memory, he longed to meet his brothers and see what elements and traits they shared.

Now, with 1's shrieking laughter assaulting his senses, 47 knew this deranged abomination was the very same he had heard that night.

He also knew that his surgical strikes had not hurt 1, the rapid breathing was due to a state of growing excitement, like the eager acceleration of bodily functions before climax.

This clone was only just starting to enjoy himself.


	13. Chapter 13

Neal could barely keep the smile from his face.

The house before him was modeled like an old Colonial; immaculate white boarding, picket fence standing like a set of giant toothpicks along the edge of the lawn, and a mailbox which was shaped and painted to resemble a miniature house.

'Did you marry a Stepford Wife, too?' he murmured, taking a final look at his surroundings before jabbing the doorbell.

Michael Stroyd had relocated to Suffolk County following the expiration of his contract with Agency, not venturing far from New York despite his constant, grumbling claims to get as far away from the place as possible the instant he retired.

It didn't surprise Neal in the least, those who were willing to admit a city like New York had their heart and soul did so with an almost perverse enthusiasm, as though daring anyone to doubt it. Others, even those who spoke of the place like it were a blight on the landscape, a foul pollution spewing infection, still found it difficult to entirely break free after spending any amount of time there.

Neal related the phenomenon to a Black Hole; it either sucked you into limbo immediately, and for all infinity, or you spent the rest of your life exerting a massive effort just to stay where you were, never entirely surrendering to it but never with any hope of escaping either.

Still, he could see why Stroyd had chosen this place as a compromise. Outside the predictable clusters of painfully twee suburban hell, stretches of lush and deep forest did their best against the imposing bulk of the city looming under twenty miles away, while open coastland and beaches rewarded anyone who ventured to the edge of Long Island.

He pressed the doorbell again.

The porch door opened moments later, Stroyd held a t.v control in one hand and wore tracksuit slacks with a gray T-shirt, perhaps he had bought a treadmill to change the habits of a lifetime.

'Yes, can I...?'.

The question died on his lips, Stroyd visibly stiffened as he recognized the man before him, his hand flexing on the door handle as though he longed to slam it in a reflex action. He drew in a deep breath, 'what do you want? I'm retired now'.

'Yes, yes I know' Neal nodded, looking out to the street, 'nice area by the way, even if you can still see the Skyscrapers'.

Stroyd sighed, he knew there was little chance of avoiding this conversation, and forcing it on his doorstep would only encourage gossip. Maybe five years ago he could have spoken and thought fast enough to turn Neal away, but retirement had no need of those skills and so they had atrophied, isolated bits of experience and gambits hung on his mind but there was no longer a means or motivation to tie them all together.

'You'd better come in'.

He led Neal through a hall which was plain and simple, blue shag carpeting which hadn't been vacuumed for some time along with a cheap coatstand supporting a single jacket. They entered the lounge, and Neal was surprised to find it just as bare as the hallway; a large, leather armchair and huge plasma screen television sat awkwardly in isolation, there were no photographs, no paintings, not even a coffee table.

In a moment of astonishment he realised there wasn't even a second chair.

'You-uh.....have to sit on the floor, I'm afraid' Stroyd shrugged, 'want a beer?'.

Neal shook his head, 'no thanks, stopped drinking a while back'.

The other man half-sat, half-fell into the armchair and allowed it to cushion and consume him, 'yeah, I tried to be like him for a while too'.

Neal lowered himself to the floor and sat cross-legged, 'I'm sorry?'.

Stroyd grimaced, 'the reason you're here, that's what I'm talking about. Kind of flattered Agency sent one of their best to intimidate me, but I'll tell you the same I told them, I don't know anything. Been out of the loop for years now'.

It was a pre-constructed speech, even so after speaking it Stroyd seemed to melt a little further into the armchair as though just the effort of speaking had exhausted him. He had never been a fit man, but the changes were alarming to anyone who hadn't seen or spoken to him for several years.

Stroyd used to take immense care in his appearance, the genetic lottery hadn't granted him good looks, height, or a hairline which survived past his early thirties, so he had developed an impeccable sense of style to compensate. Neal wondered where those suits were now, gone the same way as Stroyd's lethally sharp business tactics most probably, discarded in favour of low maintenance garments with expanding waistbands.

'Nobody ever gets out of the loop' Neal said, smiling, 'you can't tell me you haven't kept up, putting out feelers to see the way the tide is turning since Agency strapped on that golden parachute'.

'Believe whatever you like' Stroyd replied, sounding immensely tired, 'you see this room? This is what happens to people like us. One day someone tears your skin off and expects you to live without it, to _enjoy_ living without it. You think I have any desire to remind myself of what I no longer have, what I no longer do?'.

'Perhaps not' Neal agreed, raising an eyebrow at the dramatics, 'but I know you've kept up with what happened to Agent 47. Just like me'.

'I tried to be like him' Stroyd repeated, his tone vacant and removed, 'after Uganda...he made me feel...not just glad to be alive, glad to be a _man._ Like I was sitting on top of some vast, untapped power, just forgotten how to use it, how to recognise it'.

Neal frowned, 'Uganda...that was over eight years ago, you supplied arms to our Mercs?'.

Stroyd pulled a disgusted expression, waving his hand as though details only clouded the issue, 'yeah yeah, Government hired Agency to hunt down a group of Guerrillas. Peacekeepers couldn't touch them, knew the area too well, I was Quartermaster for the detail'.

'Did you ever see him again, after that?'.

'Of course not, Agency didn't know what he was worth back then, he was piled in with the rest of the meat. They learnt though, soon enough, just e-mails after Uganda. Electronic whispers'.

Neal watched Stroyd carefully, the other man was beginning to slur and his eyes were half-lidded, this wasn't his first drink.

Stroyd seemed to drift off, staring into space for a minute after he drained the last of the Budweiser. In an instant he snapped back, hostility replacing the weariness which seemed to be crushing him earlier; 'Why are you _here_ Neal? You want to squash him just like all the others, don't you? Well, fuck you! He never was a puppet, never will be! Hell, he's more honest than any of us, more honest than you. Just him at the end of the day, just him, no drink, no drugs, and no endless line of whores either!'.

Anger rippled through Neal, he stood and closed the distance between them, 'no more bullshit, tell me where he is'.

'Go to hell!' Stroyd said, laughing as though this was a good joke.

He squawked as the other man grabbed two fistfuls of his T-shirt, hauled him out of the chair and launched him across the room.

Stroyd seemed to frantically pace for a moment, arms pumping and legs surging, before he crashed to the floor with a dull _'uh'._

Neal reached behind and drew a Sig Sauer from his waistband, cocking it, 'I don't have time to play games. There's nobody who would miss you, Michael'.

Rolling over, Stroyd sneered at the pistol, 'you always were a dupe, Neal. You've modelled yourself on one man but you're willing to kill him when someone orders it, pathetic'.

'It's not for Agency' Neal said, 'I want to help him'.

'_You_ want to help _him_?' Stroyd shook his head, 'I don't buy it. He never needed help before, besides...why should I believe you? Undertaking this little mission without the knowledge or approval of Agency? I don't think so'.

'I no longer work for Agency'.

He hadn't willed the words, yet they came so easily it was as though they had existed inside him for years now but something finally shook them loose. The sudden possibilities and unwelcome changes that they promised near paralysed him, as it was he just found the strength to slowly lower himself onto Stroyd's leather recliner.

It hurt, it hurt so much that Neal would have sworn this was not a good thing if he hadn't known better; change never came in a swift, refreshing breeze, it came as a rusty butcher's hook which tore chunks of flesh from your spirit, leaving it to bleed and bleed until finally the wound would close.

The other man blinked, far more afraid of this revelation then he had ever been of the Sig Sauer, 'do they know this?' he asked quietly.

'Not yet' Neal admitted, studying the pistol as though he had never seen it before, 'but they will, they'll find somebody else. They did for you'.

Stroyd sighed, backing himself up to lean against the wall, 'you know it's not that simple, they let me go willingly'.

'Yeah' Neal said, giving a slight smile, 'I know'.

'You need weapons?'.

'You're still selling?'.

Stroyd shrugged, 'old habits die hard. Don't really need the money, probably creating even more problems with the people I sell this shit to now. You'd be better than most, I guess'.

Neal stood, clicking the safety on the Sig and offering Stroyd a hand up, 'you realize what I'm about to do. What Agency will do to you if they find out you had a hand in it?'.

Grunting, the other man heaved himself to his feet, 'I'm not slow, Neal. Just deal with your end and I'll deal with mine, I'll even tell you how to find 47'.

'Why?'.

Stroyd let out a brilliant smile, and for the first time looked remarkably close to the shrewd arms-dealer Neal had once known, 'because you're up to your neck in it, and after three years of eating microwave meals and watching trash t.v you have no idea how grateful I am to see you like this'.


	14. Chapter 14

He knew the sensation of being used.

It was not offensive, nor even unexpected, simply his lot as an assassin; a tool, a weapon to be targeted and used by anyone who could afford him. All those years with Agency, as Controllers came and went, he allowed the manipulation as it gave him a sense of purpose.

As the money turned from four figures into five, into six, seven, stacking up in his account and drawing the attention of fawning admirers, he lived as simply and as basically as ever before. Money _was_ spent, but invested only in more advanced devices to deliver bullets, which in turn killed new targets, delivering more money, buying more devices, an endless cycle never questioned.

_Yet, to be used by your own brother._

47 stepped back, his fists swollen and raw, cuts splitting the skin as though he had been driving them into a nest of thorns. 1 had not even attempted to fight, just allowed the blows to cascade into him, and now it was all too evident why.

Something was stirring inside the other man, he twitched and grunted as it grew, eyes rolled up in their sockets and teeth gritted so tightly it seemed they would explode into bone-white powder at any moment. Against his better instincts, to go for the Glock and finish this now, 47 found himself rooted to the spot with a perverse curiosity.

1 was now frothing at the mouth; a bestial mix of snarling and howling noises crawled up from his throat, his fingers raked across the kitchen worktop hard enough to split nails.

Swallowing, 47 closed the distance between them, drawing his hand back to strike a precision blow to the other man's spinal cord. 

'Forgive him holy father, for he knows not what he does'. 

As though responding to these words, 1's eyes snapped back into focus and he launched himself at 47 with a bellow of rage. Shoulder impacting at 47's waist, 1 wrapped his arms around his brother, bringing the two of them down onto the floor with tremendous force. Rotten boards cracked and splintered, offering only a second of resistance before snapping like gunshots, sending both figures tumbling into the room beneath. 

Billowing clouds of dust and plaster filled the air, enraged shouts from a surprised tenant carrying through the whirl of grit, as 1 grabbed 47's head and slammed it hard against the wall. Colour spots detonated behind his eyes, but even as the world washed out of focus for valuable seconds he was driving a series of sledgehammer blows into his brother's body. 

Every single hit was precise, fighting blind was one of his many skills, yet they hit an unyielding wall of muscle set hard as rock. Before he could regain his senses, 1 had hauled 47 to his feet and thrown him into the room, he tried to keep his balance but crumpled to the floor with a grunt_._ Injuries stacked up in his brain; his shoulder was dislocated and skull possibly fractured, a sharp, tight band of pain was wrapped around his cranium like super-heated barbed wire. 

Logical to the end, part of his mind was still cataloguing and memorizing every inhabitant and piece of furniture in the room. Glazed eyes stared back at him, there were people laid out on blankets, slumped against the wall, some merely pale and drawn but others as cadaverous and wasted as living corpses. The place stank of sweat, urine, and something far worse; not so much an odour as a slow, painful bleeding of emotion, numbness and despair.

Groaning, 47 propped himself up on one elbow, not even to his feet when 1 erupted from the still settling plaster mist and came for him. There was no desperation in 47's actions, just actions based on a conclusion; somehow his brother was able to control muscle mass and adrenaline, which left few vulnerable areas left to strike.

Snatching a crack pipe from the floor, he drove it as hard as he could against 1's right eye, using his brother's own momentum to aid the force of the blow. The glass shattered, driving shards deep into 47's hand, sending 1 staggering back. It seemed to take a moment before he comprehended the injury, then 1 threw a hand to his face and let out a scream of pure rage, the hideous grin returning despite tears of blood flowing steadily down his cheek.

47 slammed his right shoulder against an outcrop of wall, popping the joint back into its socket with a strangled cry of pain, and stared at 1 as he tugged a shard of pipe glass from his palm.

Reassuring to know that even in this fight there was an eye to the storm, but he resisted the urge to fall into it and balled his sliced hand into a fist, using the pain. 

_Now, now!_

Lunging forward, 47 stabbed his fingers at the other man's windpipe, driving the other hand down to shatter his collarbone. 1 responded with a series of spidery counter-moves, deflecting both blows, his limbs moving as quickly to thwart any more strikes as 47 could try to land them. To the occupants of the room, it must have seemed like some bizarre hallucination. No-one alive could move this fast, could fight with such precision even as the remains of their sclera bled and oozed between jagged shards, to believe anything else was madness.

The barrage continued for over two minutes, 47 could have lasted far longer but in a second of weakness, a missed opportunity, 1 took the initiative. His strikes registered as little more than a blur, slamming home with staggering force, and 47 only managed to deflect those that would otherwise have killed him outright.

One final punch slammed into his chest, breaking ribs, and 47 was thrown sprawling with the force of the blow. Gasping, he tried to stay conscious, the room was blurring in and out of focus now, his body felt far from the precision machine he was used to, now more a mass of fractured bones, torn muscle, and pounding blood, stitched together by one long thread of agony.

'_S-__…__stop__'___he choked, _'__th-__…__there has to be an end to this, brother__…__must not kill brother. Fight against what you are, what they made you, you..you don__'__t owe them anything!__'__. _

1 cocked his head, like a curious dog, then the grin returned as quickly as it was lost. 47 felt a wave of hopelessness crash over him, he had ruined all other chances to reason with his kind, to try and make them understand, now all that was left was this mad dog, the thing he tried so hard to contain within himself.

_Beaten._

No bitterness, just a strange relief, perhaps this was always the way it was meant to end.

1 stepped forward, snapping his right fist down, the movement causing a punch-dagger to spring from his sleeve with an audible _sh-kik!_

'You mother-..'. 

The baseball bat caught him in the left temple, 1 was already turning as he heard the _whoosh_ of misplaced air but the blow was fast and savage, even his reflexes couldn't override the element of surprise. His head twisted violently, vertebrae cracking in his neck, and he went down hard. 

47 blinked, staring up at his savior, a man with a shaven, dented head and piercings which gleamed in his face like the rivets on an industrial liner. He spat after 1, 'fucking cunt! Bust in here, fuck my shit up, I'm gonna rip your balls off! Then I'll start on your boyfriend over there!'. 

'_No!__'___47 coughed, _'__Get out of here!__'__. _

'Oh, so now you givin _me_ orders?' the Dealer snorted, 'don't suppose you want me to do this neither'. 

Turning, he swept the bat above his head and brought it down on 1's spine, the clone sagged but didn't crumple as the Dealer expected. Infuriated, he lashed out in a frenzy, face burning red and spit flying from his lips, dealing out a beating that would cripple any normal man.

1 waited for the next swing, raising an arm to meet it, then uncoiled his body like a snake, lashing out with his left hand.

47 couldn't make out what had happened for a moment, just the Dealer's astonished expression and huge, bulging eyes. Letting out a series of gurgling gasps, he reached up the cavity now sliced in his throat, horror dominating his expression as 1 opened his hand and let the contents of it fall to the floor with a wet _slap._

Lying on the boards like a lethargic, gray snake was the Dealer's severed windpipe.

Letting out a noise which 47 never wanted to hear again; a mewling rasp that seemed to rattle from the remains of his trachea, the Dealer stumbled forward a few steps and then collapsed. Even though he had consigned himself to death, actually wished for it now, 47's logical mind forced him to pay attention. 

To see the S&W Sigma tucked down the back of the Dealer's waistband.

1 saw it too, the grin twisted on his lips and he charged.


	15. Chapter 15

The vagrant had arrived just over seven days ago, driving a battered Oldsmobile Toronado with one shattered headlight and a bonnet stripped nearly clean of paint. Dust covered the body of the car, the exhaust belching out fumes as it juddered along, a once powerful engine now rasping and growling like a confused and wounded wild animal. Coin-sized pools of liquid marked the Toronado's path right up to an abandoned lot which it swerved into, the machine's pain finally ending in a harsh rattling, causing the group of youths stood nearby to laugh and cheer.

As the smoke settled, a snarling man emerged from the driver's side, letting out a stream of lazy profanity, every word blending into the next as though the situation was so unbearable it deserved every curse he knew. 'Fucker' the vagrant rasped, spittle showering his brittle and matted beard, 'cunt-fuckersonbitch, pieceofgodamnwhorefuckingshitcock-knockerbastard, fuck _fuck! Cunt, CUNT!'_.

The youths were howling in laughter now, applauding his violent outbursts, even him flipping them the finger resulted in cries of encouragement; 'Hey man, don't get mad, get even! Show that piece of shit who's the boss!', 'watch it homes! I'll jack that, long as you help me push it away!', 'check the oil! Check the oil!', 'Nah man, its the transition!', 'Transition! What the fuck you talkin about fool, you don't know shit about cars!'.

Muttering, the vagrant walked around and popped the bonnet, a sudden blast of steam into his face rewarding the effort. Howling, he swatted at his face, 'poison! Fuck, _fuck!'_.

'Oh shit man, he's been poisoned!'.

'Ain't no cure for that, he's a dead man!'.

Wafting away the steam, the vagrant peered down at the engine, his hands not moving to check parts or levels, but rather clamping down on the chassis as though the vehicle might try to retreat from his stare. Minutes passed, chatter from the gang had now faded to quiet murmurings and an occasional chuckle, the vagrant had become a creature which was not to be startled or scared away, he was too interesting, too unpredictable.

'Donknow, donknow' he sighed, scratching at an armpit, 'gas poison, gas poison kill the beauty'.

Arms falling to his side, he bowed his head and began to softly whisper, as if deep in prayer. So oddly moving was the scene that some expected to see the soul of the Toronado detaching itself from the dead engine, drifting up and away into the overcast afternoon sky.

The Vagrant finished whispering, sighed again, and nodded to the car before slamming the bonnet back down. Downcast, he shuffled around the side of the Toronado and opened the back door, easing himself down to lie on the seats.

Nobody came to move him along, any Police called to the area had no wish to deal with minor infractions, simply doing their job then leaving such a squalid area was stressful enough without taking on extra work. To the residents, used to tolerating far worse, the Vagrant was an almost likeable eccentric. His Toronado fired their imaginations into envisaging someone who had once been on top of the world, yet when everything went wrong the only thing he had been able to hold onto was his pride and joy, his car, and as the years passed by even his passion of caring for that had waned.

Soon enough he was christened simply 'Driver'.

Driver didn't spend much time outside of the Toronado, many hours were killed sat behind the wheel, lightly tugging on his beard and continuing that same relentless whispering. He looked like a man trying to divide and calculate impossible numbers in his mind, chasing a solution which could never be reached. Perhaps Driver had once been a Scientist or Theorist of some note, someone mused, and now stripped of his equipment and staff he continued to create and examine formula to the detriment of everything else.

Most unusually, he was offered food without needing to beg for it, offerings were laid on the paint-stripped bonnet like tributes to some enigmatic God. The simple fact, although it was never really spoken of directly, was that nobody wanted Driver to leave, he leant a welcome spice and pleasure to their lives with his odd yet sympathetic character.

Local mechanics came to examine the Toronado, men who charged too much for the simplest services yet looked over the car as though it were a piece of local history, far before their time, made present and fresh once again. Driver watched them work at the engine, shifting his weight from one foot to another as he continued to whisper, nodding slightly in quiet approval.

Replacement parts would be needed, they decided.

Such was the pull of Driver's appeal many half-expected to see donation jars scattered across their local businesses, filled with quarters and folded bills, labelled **"Let's get Driver going again!"**. No parts were ordered, no funds were gathered, Driver had become a part of the neighbourhood, and now the tolerance of his company had grown into a determination to keep him in place.

The week had become bleaker and darker as it drew on, with weather reports threatening a storm moving towards the city, all colour seemed to have drained out of the landscape until it resembled a two-tone negative. On the Saturday, someone wearing a hooded sweatshirt was dropped at the edge of the street, their posture hunched and pace fast.

Pausing mid-whisper, Driver opened his eyes and looked up as the figure slammed open the door of a nearby slum block and disappeared inside.

It began to rain.


	16. Chapter 16

He began to fire.

The pistol was small and compact, no more than a six round clip, he could tell by the weight that the ammunition was not high caliber. Every shot would have to count.

47's first bullet went wide, carving a small chunk from the plaster, by the time he corrected for his double-vision 1 was only six feet away. Jerking the Sigma to the right, 47 pumped the trigger, sending the remainder of the clip out in a concentrated hail.

1 staggered as the rounds ripped into his chest, spraying tiny geysers which pooled into crimson petals on his shirt. He hit the wall, driven back with the kinetic impacts, yet even as he peeled himself away from the plaster 47 could see that there was no blood splattering it.

_Didn't even penetrate._

Almost arrogant in his victory, 1 paused, grinning, as he probed the bullet wounds curiously with an outstretched finger. 47 could only watch as his brother's digits dissapeared into one of the craters, the grimace on his face almost one of pleasure, before emerging a second later with a flattened metal slug which he dropped to the floor.

Watching the slug's erratic, rolling path for a moment, he then turned his attention back to 47 and started forward.

The apartment door smashed open, causing 1 to spin round, and 47 saw Avidan Kurtzweil brandishing a double-barrelled shotgun. The Landlord was plainly terrified, his grip on the weapon so tight that his hands were drained white, yet he took one step, then another, and swallowed before speaking.

'I've called the Police! I...I don't want to hurt you but I will if..._if you don't step away!'_ his voice raised from a stammer into near-shriek, nerves forcing him to launch the words out before they could become trapped in his throat.

1 looked between 47 and Kurtzweil, the motion slow and unhurried, then, in a blindingly fast movement, launched himself at the Landlord.

The punch-dagger lashed out, sinking into Kurtzweil's left shoulder, driving out a scream of agony before his finger twitched on the triggers. Both barrels erupted into 1's stomach, point-blank blast throwing him against the wall like a rag-doll, he sagged to the floor seemingly battered and broken.

47's ears rang with the shotgun report, he dragged himself up to a sitting position and looked, first at the immobile 1 then over at Kurtzweil. The Landlord had slid down to a sitting position, whimpering as his fingers came away bloody after touching the shoulder wound, amazingly he twisted his mouth into a smile and nodded at 47, 'Mr Ableman'.

If there was anytime in his life the Assassin thought he could have smiled it was then, yet before another word or gesture could be exchanged the body beside him began to stir.

_No, no it's impossible!_

Bloody froth dripping from his mouth, 1 stabbed the punch-dagger into a floorboard and used it to haul himself to a juddering stand. His shirt was shredded but still intact, the skin beneath blistered and bleeding, but the grin was gone and had now been replaced by an expression of burning rage. 47 tried to rise when another explosion of agony, washing out his eyes, caused him to topple back to the floor, he regained his vision just in time to see 1 driving the punch-dagger into Kurzweil's chest.

'No!'.

The cry was impotent, by the time 47 had forced himself to his feet, fought down the nausea, 1 was nowhere to be seen. He moved across to Kurtzweil, the Landlord now led in a pool of blood with a look of perpetual surprise frozen on his face.

No pulse.

Anger came, 47 was used to that, he knew how to harness it, control it, it allowed him to bolster his damaged body, burned out the sickness which kept the room spinning. There was nothing more he could do here, no time to go back for another weapon, he had to get out.

He moved as fast as he was able, unhindered by other tennants, every single apartment door he saw was closed and, no doubt, now locked and bolted. 47 stayed alert, half-expecting 1 to step from behind the next corner, to slam into him from behind, but his clone brother had evidently kept running.

Taking a deep breath, he swung open the lobby door and swept back, out of sight.

The street was clear, an overturned grocery bag had spilt shopping across the road, he saw shadowy figures lurking in shop doorways and behind a decaying wall. It only took a few seconds to identify them as voyeurs of potential violence, another assassin wouldn't be seen at all, these people were anxious of being caught in the conflict but longed to see it spill outside - perhaps able to then boast how they'd seen a man shot in broad daylight, how close they had been and how it had felt.

Just voyeurs and the vagrant.

47 shouldered the door open wider and darted out into the street, only realising when he was open, exposed, that the instinct he had been trying so hard to ignore these past few hours was screaming like a banshee.

The vagrant, Driver they called him, he wasn't in the Oldsmobile.

_He never leaves it._

That particular abberation was swiftly addressed when Driver stepped out from behind the vehicle, cradling a HKG36 assault rifle, and opened fire.


	17. Chapter 17

Neal was one block away when he heard the gunfire, chattering through the air like the call of some mechanical bird. While other vehicles slammed their brakes on, pulling frantic U-Turns and gears crunching as they were forced into reverse, he pressed his foot down on the accelerator and weaved around them. There was a scream of metal on metal as he tore past a blue Ford, ripping off a side mirror and shattering the left headlight, but the driver simply threw his arms up and cowered.

The bursts were clearer now, even as Neal increased his speed he still had no idea what to do once he arrived. It should have frightened him, but he knew this sensation, all excess thoughts and worries had been formatted from his mind and every action was now in the hands of a tried and tested programme. Whatever was about to happen he could handle it, _would_ handle it, if he didn't believe that absolutely then all the guns, muscle, and martial arts in the world weren't worth a thing, he'd be immobilised by his emotions just like that other driver.

Gunman. Street. Cover

He could see the shooter now, a bedraggled looking homeless man holding a weapon he should never have been able to afford, yet his stance was practised and he wasn't spraying indiscriminately. The target was a Ford Pinto parked on the other side of the street, windows already splintered into jagged shards and bodywork pocked with dozens of bulletholes which looked like a swarm of fat, black insects on the metal.

Neal started to spin the wheel, tugging up the handbrake a second later and swinging the car 180 degrees in a whirl of tyre smoke. The rear end crashed into the side of a nearby vehicle, stacking up the damage on his Dodge Viper, but all Neal was concerned with was getting as much steel between him and the assault rifle as possible. It could have been seen as a professional move, so he hugged the seats until he was sure the assassin hadn't tagged him as a threat, then opened the driver's door and swept out to crouch in front of the bonnet of the car he'd broadsided.

He hadn't expected trouble and cursed himself for it, he had nothing to equal the gunman's firepower. Taking a deep breath, he reached inside his jacket and drew the USP Tactical from its shoulder-holster, thumbing down the safety.

There was already a distant wail of sirens, a few minutes away at best.

Neal moved round the side of the parked car, catching sight for the first time of Agent 47, swearing as he did so. The man he had come to assist was now a rescue mission, trails of blood pattered the pavement under 47, his head lolled as though he was struggling to remain conscious, his hands were balled tightly into fists but there was no gun in either of them.

'47!' Neal yelled over the gunfire, 'Stephen Neal, I'm getting you out of here'.

The head rolled round, eyes trying to focus on him, when a bullet ripped through the Pinto's chassis, no more than an inch from 47's temple.

'There's no more time!' Neal said, rising as he did so, 'move!'.

He swept up the USP, squeezing off a barely aimed volley of three shots, exploding one of the Oldsmobile's side windows and forcing the gunman to duck for cover. The .45 rounds punched large pock-marks in the steel body of the car, recoil kicking the pistol back against his grip, but the battered chassis still protected the assassin from every one of his bullets.

Neal's mind subtracted the rounds.

_Seven...five...three...one...click._

He shot right to the end of the clip, another stupid mistake, the empty _snap_ rang out impossibly loud, somehow heard even above the closing sirens, and the gunman stepped back into view. There was a hollow outburst of air, even as he heard it and the word formed in his mind there was no time to shout a warning, no time to act.

_Incoming. _

The car beside him detonated with a scream that perforated Neal's left eardrum, his body cracked against the wall as it was thrown through the air, and for a moment all he could see was a brilliant, white light. Through force of will, luck, he didn't black out, but came to with pain lancing from a dozen different directions, his arm numb and unresponsive, something warm and sticky gumming his right eye.

He had lost the USP.

Unarmed.

Neal tensed as a figure moved toward him, obscured by heat waves and smoke, he hitched up his right trouser leg and drew the 5 inch blade from its sheath. 47 stepped out of the haze, his eyes unfocussed, 'no need for that, he's gone'.

The two men stared at each other for long moments, the ruined car chassis next to Neal continuing to spit and crackle as flames ate the upholstery. 47 tilted his head to the noise of the sirens and braced himself, offering Neal a hand, 'we should go too. _Now_'.

Nodding, Neal allowed the assassin to help him up, then grabbed 47 as he staggered from the sudden exertion, they were both in no shape to fight. Supporting one another, the two men reached Neal's Viper, collapsing into it as though they had just finished a marathon.

Slamming the car into gear, Neal tore off, the powerful engine roaring as it was quickly coaxed to near full-speed. He cornered and left the street, worrying for a moment about the handgun which had been left behind, it was a piece of evidence which would entice the Police to think of this as more than a simple gang war.

Only when he'd cleared another block did Neal slow the car, threading it easily into the artery-like traffic stream. 47 looked over, blinking, 'your arm'.

Blood was dripping onto the leather seats from his left tricep, a thin, razor-sharp slither of shrapnel glinted from the muscle. Neal wondered why he could barely feel it, perhaps shock, adrenaline, neither would last long.

'We need to get rid of this car' he said quickly, 'breaks my heart to do it'.

47 thinned his eyes, a dozen unasked questions hanging between them, but he was still a professional and knew what could wait. 'We need medical attention' he said, 'I may be bleeding internally, you're hurt worse than you think'.

'Who hit you today?' Neal wondered aloud, 'it wasn't the moron with the assault rifle, was it?'.

47 murmured something, Neal could barely pick it out with his good ear, sounded like..._another, _maybe _brother?_ He had little time to think about it before the voice ramped back up to a commanding level, 'medical attention, Neal'.

He nodded, forcing himself to focus on the road, not on the absence of triumph, of excitement, that he felt. He had given up everything to help this man, even his life if Agency had any say in it, so why did the very presence of him make his skin crawl, let him _know_ that he was sitting next to more of an enemy than a friend?

_Shouldn't be like this, shouldn't be..._

A mistake.


	18. Chapter 18

_Fuck fuck **fuck!**_

His thoughts were moving too fast, making it difficult to concentrate on planning, on just moving.

_Failed? No, no that grenade took out one of them, I saw him fly, should've pressed home the advantage, should've gone in..._

Paul Jacob stood, hands trembling with adrenaline as he looped the HKG36 around his right shoulder and enveloped it inside his overcoat. His teeth were chattering too, snapping out a manic rhythm which made his jaw feel numb, still he could only afford himself two deep breaths before rushing down the alleyway.

The air was filled with a screeching of tires, the clapping of car doors opening, and of sirens finally ceasing their relentless scream. There was no time to disassemble the assault rifle and dump its component parts, he thought for a moment of stashing it inside a nearby dumpster overflowing with ripe waste but no, no...

_Fingerprints._

Too many mistakes already, they piled up around him like bricks cementing together to form an airtight prison. Empty shell casings from the G36 littered the area he'd just fled, he wasn't so much concerned about those giving him away as he was by the messy and amateurish flow of it all, the clumsy motions akin to a virgin embarrassing himself with a first sexual encounter.

A flush of red stung his cheeks, he stepped out into the next block and, finding it deserted, marched quickly across the road. He was on the verge of hyperventilating so forced himself to focus on the scene, to take in the details around him, overwhelm the emotional with the analytical.

Graffiti lined the walls of the next alleyway, luminous lime green spray paint which twisted and span in fat coils, it shone amongst all the dirt and the gloom like something out of a cartoon rather than real-life. The rain hammering down around him, as hard and constant as a shower of blunt nails, seemed to magnify the stench of decaying food and rotten cardboard.

Lurching over to the wall, Jacob vomited onto the concrete, voiding his stomach until it creased with empty heaves. Tears came to his eyes, he angrily wiped them away as he gulped and heaved in more of the stale air. To hell with professionalism, to hell with safety, he gave himself a minute there, resting his head against the brickwork and trying to regain his senses.

_Just another bum who's had too much to drink too early in the day, nothing to see here boys._

Jacob gritted his teeth as the moment of respite allowed a hundred tiny agonies to swell all over his body, muscles and tendons voicing their displeasure at the way they had been bunched and twisted over the past week. He welcomed the pain, it drove away the haziness, punished him for being so weak and pathetic, reminded him that no matter how much he was hurting now he could _always_ hurt more.

Raising both hands, Jacob scrubbed at the water on his face.

Straightening up, he spat bile and swallowed a searing mouthful of it before starting down the remainder of the alleyway.

There was a split not far up ahead, he decided to keep to these warrens for as long as possible, after all this was where people like him were supposed to dwell.

_Keep in character._

He tried to ignore the heaviness of the sodden overcoat on his back, the way the G36 kept bashing into his side, and most of all how very much he now felt like Paul Jacob again rather than a vicious and calculating predator.

Paul Jacob the Administrator, Paul Jacob the Accounts Assistant, Paul Jacob the office worker and card stamper.

He was now a more than adequate marksman, proficient in Krav Maga and Ju-Jitsu, his body forced to a level of physical fitness it had never even approached before, but still the core of him remained small and vulnerable.

_'You can't just step into something like this, learn the skills do the training, it doesn't work like that. You need to be ready to give some things up, and not question what those things might be'. _

He remembered the words with a crystal clarity, spoken by someone who finally decided to let him into their confidence, a cousin he knew only as 'Joe'. Jacob would see him at various family functions; weddings, funerals, anniversaries, always aside from the main crowd and never encouraging conversation, though he was never less than polite and articulate if anyone approached him.

Even before he knew what Joe did, Jacob felt a great empathy for the man, they were both inwardly screaming at the banality of these events, always wishing for something more, something greater when everyone around them seemed content with their bland smalltalk and their mundane, meandering lives. Jacob was thirty-two when he knew he was on the edge, the last traces of hope and enthusiasm were bleeding away, he was close, so close to just shutting down and going through the motions for the rest of his life.

Nobody understood, those he confided in listened with well-meaning attention but never fully saw the desperation, the slow grinding down of spirit, they were as blind to it in his existence as they were in their own.

_'Get a new hobby, do some travelling, meet a nice girl, change your job'. _

'NO!' he wanted to bellow into their faces, 'you're not fucking listening!'.

Then all at once it hit him, he took the one piece of advice with a bitter relish, twisting it in a way the speaker had never intended.

_Change your job. _

All those lazy fantasies of grabbing a co-worker and smashing their face repeatedly into a desk, driving it down, down, down, until their teeth cracked and flew apart like a broken pearl necklace, until ribbons of blood spilled through the air, until their vacant, smiling face was little more than a pulped mass unable to see, speak, or hear.

Pressing a gun to the back of a suave Don Juan's head while he chuckled and grinned, and blowing his brains across the face of whomever was finding him just so fucking fascinating.

All just enjoyable escapism, it was male nature to dream about murdering someone when they upset or thwarted you in some way, a throwback to the primitive days when such things were settled with a club to the back of the cranium. Yet with each new day he thrilled in these moments more and more, at first it concerned him greatly but he still had respect for those who deserved it, he would never hit a woman nor harm a child - his more animalistic side was simply showing itself and after countless hundreds of thousands of hours spent sitting at a desk, tapping figures onto a screen and keeping his balls safe at home on the couch, right next to the potato chips, it felt _good._

Why shouldn't he make a living through murder? He could pick and choose the cases, execute only those he deemed unworthy, it was perfect.

Of course, now came the tricky part.

Getting established.

After some research online he found a book called Hit Man, a guide to assassination which was claimed to have been written by a professional. He printed out the work in its entirety and absorbed every word, finding it, in turns, fascinating and intimidating. There was no humour in the prose, the author wasn't trying to make a friend or entertain, but it was a comprehensive and invaluable work.

He started exercising, changed his diet, took up Martial Arts classes in the city which featured neither small kids nor middle-aged women, with every new day it felt as though he were physically and mentally taller. Jacob began testing himself, provoking fights in order to hone his skills and focus in critical situations, picking someone at random on the street and tailing them unseen for an entire day, experimenting with as many different pistols as he could lay his hands on at various gun-clubs.

The next time he saw Joe he approached him with little hesitation, suggested they go for a drink after the gathering was over with. After a skinful of beers he found himself admitting everything to this near stranger, simply because he still felt there was something connecting them, something vital and important.

That instinct turned out to be correct.

Jacob may not have believed in God but he believed in 'The Universe', and it seemed that with every step he took on this new path the universe was opening new doors for him, new possibilities.

_There'll be time for the nostalgia later._

Forcing his head free of these thoughts, Jacob heard someone muttering and scuffling in the next alleyway. Instinctively he crept his way up to the corner and peered around, surprised not to find another vagrant but the figure in the gray hoodie he'd seen entering 47's apartment block earlier.

The man rocked back and forth on the spot, hissing out air as he reached for his face, let his hands tighten into fists, fall away, then opened them up and reached again. Jacob immediately thought that he must be on drugs, the jittery, stop-start movements like slow flecks of a projector film convinced him of it, yet he'd also seen this individual fleeing the block shortly before 47 appeared - both men worse for wear.

There was a low, lasting growl as the hands reached up again, one narrowing into two fingers and a thumb pinched together, and jabbed forward. It pulled back, and there was an organic _snap_ which Jacob knew would be burned into his memory from then on, gore-plastered fingers drew apart and something fell soundlessly to the concrete.

Then, with calculated relish, he raised a boot and slammed it down onto the object.

The man twisted around, staring up and down the alleyway, his teeth bared in an expression which seemed half agony, half rage. Jacob noticed two things at once then, the first was the socket, weeping blood, where the man's right eye should have been. Second was the face itself, identical to that of 47, something which sent Jacob's mind whirling.

_Did he run here and the other guy fled in the Viper? No, that doesn't make sense, why would he risk his life then abandon him. Identical twin? Maybe an addict brother who went to squeeze 47 for drug money and they got in a fight. _

Raising his hood again, the figure charged across the alleyway and drove his fists repeatedly into a steel dumpster, denting the metal with impossibly powerful blows until all the rage seemed to sag out of him and he stood limp for a moment.

Then, as though receiving a inaudible radio transmission, he moved quickly down the alleyway.

_He's your only lead._

Sighing, already resigned to following a druggie aimlessly through this godawful weather, knowing he couldn't return empty-handed, Jacob began to follow.


	19. Chapter 19

-1

Even though unfortunate circumstances always led to Neal meeting Dr Glick, he inevitably enjoyed every visit simply due to the ingenuity of Aleksander's setup and location.

Glick knew the instant he was dishonourably discharged from the Military that his days of conventional practise were over, it was true that the entirety of the case against him wasn't known but enough had leaked out nonetheless. He had used the first Iraq war as an excuse to try out his own combat cocktails on unwitting soldiers, administering them under the guise of inoculations. What was less well known was that the results were stellar, and the only reason he didn't end up serving in a stockade was because he assisted in refining his formulae for elite units.

The Doctor would never receive an iota of official credit, naturally, yet often marvelled that he was allowed to live when he still knew how to brew such things from base ingredients. Perhaps it was an act of quiet gratitude from the higher-ups, more likely he had slipped between the cracks somehow and eventually some long-forgotten paper trail would be taken back up one day.

Shortly after leaving the Military he faked his own death, meticulously erasing any kind of electronic record which might hint to such an act, and rented two 48 feet cargo containers down on a Brooklyn Dock under an assumed name. There were other, quieter locations, but Glick didn't want to disappear from sight entirely, even though he viewed those around him with suspicion he would've been driven out of his mind in total isolation.

Neal shared a closer bond with him than many, simply because he had taken what was, in retrospect, a stupidly dangerous move when first meeting the Doctor. Ten years ago, still filled with an idiotic, inflated confidence, he thought it might be amusing to bring along a slew of articles written about Glick since his disappearance.

Taken from medical journals, mainstream magazines, newspapers, they portrayed Glick as everything from an egotistical, unfeeling academic who used people as his personal petri dishes, to a brave man who risked his life and career to give those around him the best possible chance of surviving in battle.

The Doctor received them with astonishment, disregarding Neal as he retreated to a fold-out camping bed to better study the clippings. He read largely in silence, occasionally chuckling and shaking his head, frowning, grimacing, smiling and sighing. They were handed back to Neal with a humourless smile, 'I suppose you thought it would shock me, anger me, to bring these' Glick mused, 'you're a cocky prick, Neal, but nonetheless I did enjoy them, and I know I can trust you'.

'Trust me? H-..'.

The Doctor held up a hand to silence him, 'I know I can trust you because you're transparent, I can...see enough, understand enough of you to make me comfortable. Everyone else keeps their cards close to their chests, but you just lay yours on the table because you don't know any better'.

'You don't know me' Neal said.

Glick smiled, 'oh, but I do. Mercenaries are rarely complex people, Neal, in many ways they're far simpler to understand than the man who gets up in the morning, puts on a suit, and goes to a job he's hated for fifteen years. You have no respect for others, at best they're a simple blueprint to you, at worst an ill-defined shape which walks, looks, and talks something like a human being'.

'If that's true' Neal replied, 'then are they so much meat to you?'.

The Doctor simply smiled again, scratching at his receding hairline with a long, slender finger, 'anyway. Now that we've established where we stand...

...let's take a look at that arm, shall we?'.

Neal rested his arm on the operating table, blood dotting the paper-thin sterile sheet beneath. 'This really would be easier if you laid down, you know' Glick murmured as he peered at the wound, reaching across for a tool on the instrument trolley opposite.

'Sorry Doc, right now it's probably not even wise for me to sit on the toilet without a gun in my hand'.

Glick chuckled, 'it's not paranoia if they're really after you, eh?'.

Neal just snorted, disturbed by how much he'd just given away, the urge to confide in someone about his strange and unnerving situation was something he'd have to keep better watch on. His mind kept returning to the man sat outside in his BMW, Neal could irrationally feel 47's eyes on him right now, as though they were not organic parts but rather twin lasers which could burn through any surface.

He was embarrassed to find himself sweating, the Doctor misread this as withheld pain and clucked his tongue, 'you push yourself too hard, Neal. Hold still now, almost got it'.

The chunk of shrapnel came lose with a wet, sucking sound, and Glick examined it for a moment before dropping the shard into a kidney shaped dish. 'I'll disinfect the wound, stitch it up, I suppose it would be asking too much for you to not put any stress on this arm for the next few weeks?'.

'I'll try. Listen, Doc, this is only part of the reason I came here'.

Glick lifted a needle and nylon thread from the trolley, 'I gather the other part didn't concern my charming company?'.

Neal took a moment to study the man, comparing what he saw to what he could remember from his last visit didn't serve to make him feel any better. It has been less than a year, yet Glick had now lost almost all of his hair, only a few greasy strands remained, this stood at odds with his beard which, once well trimmed, had seen an explosion of growth. Patches of it were red raw, as though the Doctor had been nervously tugging on those clumps, the bags under his eyes resembled two fat, leathery slugs, and his skin was far more pale than Neal remembered.

Glick's paranoia was not something to be raised lightly, despite the fact that he often joked about it himself. Outfitting two cargo containers to serve as both surgery and living accommodation might have been seen as post-modern, but also arranging your food and basic needs to be attended to without ever having to venture far from them, let alone leave the Docking Yard, was to withdraw from the world. The Doctor _needed_ intelligent company, he needed conversation and affection like any human being, without it he was gradually being hollowed out into little more than a functional, skilled shell.

_Physician heal thyself._

Well-intentioned questions crowded into Neal's mouth, he bit down on them with some effort, despite how it might nag at him in the future this was the worst possible time to try and help Aleksander Glick.

'I have a...friend waiting outside' Neal said quietly, 'he's hurt bad, I-..'.

As Glick's expression began to change, the Assassin found himself speaking faster, 'I'll pay you, of course. Twice the usual fee!'.

'This is not about money, Neal!' Glick snapped, 'it is about trust!'.

'I do trust him! I'd trust him with my life!'.

_Liar. _

The Doctor sighed, letting his hands fall to his legs with a soft _clap_, 'I expected better of you, I thought we understood each other'.

'I may as well tell you' Neal admitted, looking down at the slash in his arm as it was easier than looking into those blank eyes, 'this is probably the last time you'll see me. Something's happened, nothing seems solid...safe...anymore, I need to get away, maybe for good'.

Glick considered this, 'with your...friend?'.

Verbalising the future made Neal's stomach turn a strange, uncomfortable loop, forced him to eject his last, remaining fantasies of being 47's equal, his partner in crime, he could no more form a relationship with that thing in the car than he could with a piece of machinery.

_Thing?_

Already his mind ran away with the comparison; he could imagine Glick slicing open 47, peeling the flesh back, and finding himself confounded by complex micro-circuitry, motherboards on which some of the chips were blackened, shorted out, problems far removed from his expertise.

'He's...an associate of mine' Neal corrected, 'I suppose you could say our futures are intertwined now, for better or worse'.

'The perforated eardrum I cannot treat' Glick said quickly, seeming to seek solace in conversations where he held the knowledge and power, 'you must see a specialist, have a graft applied. Do not delay on this, it may become infected and erase what little brain you have remaining'.

Neal nodded, allowing Glick to stitch his wound together, they spent the next few minutes in uncomfortable silence until he cleared his throat, 'so, my...'.

'I will assess his injuries' the Doctor muttered, 'on one condition'.

'Name it'.

Glick snapped off the thread and closed the distance between him and Neal, his breath smelt like sour milk, 'I need a new test subject'.


	20. Chapter 20

Streetlamps flicked on as the muddy dusk finally turned into darkness, brightening the curtain of rain which lashed through the path of them into dozens of silver spears. The downpour was over three hours old, gurgling into storm-drains and forcing some of the city's homeless into makeshift shelters, others just sat out in the weather and made no effort to move; either resigned to whatever life could throw at them or determined not to bend one more inch to another's demands, even those of nature.

1 continued to trudge through the downpour, clothes now stuck to him in a second skin, he had a target in mind but his focus was slipping, every noise or movement around him was another splinter in his ever diminishing patience - it was all he could do not to lash out at every single drop of rain, swatting and clawing them from the air.

He needed a place to rest, to concentrate, a place without people.

The path he'd walked for the last two hours had taken him into a neighbourhood largely derelict. Many windows had been randomly smashed whereas others were sealed with sterling board or steel mesh, notices of condemnation seeming as randomly pinned as posters advertising old music gigs. Feeble light still burned from the insides of a handful of these slums, making the area look like a community built from a post-nuclear blast when compared to the bright and brilliant skyscrapers which blazed in the distance.

Even now, with his chest shredded and bleeding from a hail of rock-salt, bullet wounds in his pectoralis major, external oblique, and abdominal muscles, right eye torn clean from its socket, what he was experiencing couldn't quite be called discomfort. Agony surged through him, yet only in the way that electricity lights up an otherwise dead circuit, burning away other considerations and refocusing him for the next confrontation. Though 1's creator had never pushed him to these extremes, he would have been delighted with the result; a man who grows stronger, sharper, with each new injury, each new jolt of fuel, who could theoretically fight until the last dying seconds of his life.

1 noticed the approaching group long before they tagged him, but kept his head down and didn't alter a single step. They were bored and high, that much was obvious, one started reciting a falsetto version of 'singing in the rain' and was laughed at and chided by the others.

'What, man? That Gene Kelly was the shit!'.

One of the others shook his head, a man so huge his neck was buried under deep folds of skin, the expression half amusement and half irritation; 'you are some kind of faggot motherfucker for even knowing his name! Keep something useful in that head, fool'.

'I got your momma's number, that do?'.

Cries of mock-astonishment rose from the group, 'you don't talk about her' the other man said, his face suddenly sombre.

'Alright, alright' the singer raised his hands, 'it's cool. Hey, check this guy out, looks like he's been washing around out here all night'.

1 halted when the group predictably blocked his way, there were four of them, difficult to tell which ones were armed due to the clothes. 'Hey brother' the singer smiled, 'looks like you could do with a place to dry off, maybe something to eat…'.

He fished in his pocket and drew a $20 note out, waving it under 1's nose as though the smell would intoxicate him, 'this is all yours, _but_…you gotta be Gene Kelly'.

The others laughed, the huge man swatted him over the head, but the singer persisted 'come on man, it's easy! You know the tune, duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh dada!'.

1 didn't look up, saying nothing.

'What? You too good to sing for your supper?' the singer said, his tone curdling, 'start singing or th-..'.

The punch-dagger flew upwards, snapping out on its mechanism, and pierced the bottom of the singer's jaw, shredding both his hard and soft palette. 1 withdrew the blade in a jet of blood, and the singer fell backwards, eyes gaping in horror as his hands shot upwards to grip the wound.

After a moment's frozen indecision, the rest of the group acted, the huge man moving first. He threw a punch which 1 swept outside the arc of and slashed his throat with the same blade, nicking his jugular and causing a fountain of gore to spurt from the artery.

Joining his friend on the ground, they both writhed, gasping and choking.

'Shoot him, _just fucking shoot him!'._

One of the last two was trying to tug a pistol from his waistband, the firearm becoming snagged. He finally wrenched it free, jerked up his arm and started pumping the trigger.

Slugs blew chips from the pavement, zipped harmlessly into the rain, the shooter was so panicked he didn't consider using a second hand to hold his aim, recoil threw every shot wide as it jerked the barrel around. 1 darted through the fire zone and grabbed the shooter's arm, snapping it, his victim's hand sprang open and dropped the pistol to the concrete.

The remaining man had lost all sense now, he raised his .45 automatic and started putting bullets into his friend in the hope of hitting 1, all the while yelling and swearing at the top of his voice. Heavy-grain rounds tore the human-shield's spine apart, powering through his right lung, heart, and shattering his sternum. The slugs that did make it through impacted and blew out his ribs like explosive charges, splattering 1 with gore.

Pistol-hammer snapping down on an empty chamber, the lone gang member made a noise of angry helplessness and ran. 1 dropped the corpse he was now holding to the concrete, bending to pick up the pistol lying near his right foot. He aimed and purposefully fired wide, close enough that the fleeing man would think it was a near escape.

Searching the bodies, he found a new clip, loaded it, then with a smile started his casual trail of the one he had allowed to get away.


	21. Chapter 21

The house looked much like any other, though it was by some measure the most attractive prospect on the entire street. Enough insulation still remained for mildew to only speckle the walls, whereas in the other buildings it ran in thick, foaming ropes. The city had removed the staircase but not torn a hole in the roof,

and it was an old squat in a forgotten area, low on their priorities next to newer and weaker targets.

At one point someone had cared enough to fit a replacement toilet and tap back into the local water supply, as well as replace torn up floorboards, but it was effort which the current occupants took for granted. For their part they had barrcaded the doors and windows, a clumsy job next to the previous repairs but nonetheless functional, and wired up a splitter to the nearby street-lamp to power as many luxuries as possible.

1 watched at a distance as the fleeing gang member rushed inside, and as he approached he could hear muffled yelling answered by a score of other voices. The assassin walked over to the street-lamp and took hold of the cables, yanking them free, then turned to face the house.

A dozen different strategies occured to him, as briefly felt as gnat bites, before the ever present rage drowned them all. 1 ran at the closest window, tucking his knees up and bracing them as he leapt through the air. The sterling board cover nailed to the inside wall held for a second, plaster cracking as it popped free, then he was rolling across the floor and unsheathing his punch-daggers.

The closest gang member turned and fired blindly, shotgun blast lighting up the room for a split second, then screamed as 1's blade carved through his right hamstring. The leg fell out from under him, finger twitching on the second trigger he blew a hole through the plasterboard wall, then desperatly swung the weapon high and wide as his back hit the floor.

1 barely noticed when the butt struck his shoulder, he darted forward and sunk a dagger between the man's ribs, lancing his heart.

Kneeling for that second, in the oasis of light from the broken window, he was vulnerable for just a moment.

Bullets tore up the floorboards around him, lighting his movements like the slow flecks of a projector film, and 1 dived aside before the shooter adjusted. His arm cried pain, one stray 9mm licking a path across it, before he was away. The hail of rounds smacked into the dead man, misting blood, then stitched a weaving path as they chased 1 across the room.

Empty beer cans petalled into the air, torn apart, the small colour television cackled out a protest as slugs drilled through the plastic casing and slammed it off the wall. Two holes opened in the next window cover and shone muddy beams of light into the farthest corner of the room, like bleary eyes, and the gunman cursed as his magazine emptied with a _click._

He twisted on the penlight taped under the barrel and swung it quickly around the room, seeing only glittering debris and motes of dust swirling in the beam.

Hackles rose over his body as there was a cry of pain from two rooms over, a crash of furniture, then nothing. Swallowing, he fumbled another clip into the Ingram, cocking it, and forced his legs to move in the right direction.

Any thoughts of bolting through the open window shrank away as he gripped the submachine-gun like a lifebelt, it reminded him that he didn't deserve the Ingram if he let hopped-up pricks put any fear his way. He blew out a breath and walked slowly across the room, feet knocking away the wreckage with harsh little sounds that were almost as loud as the gunshots, then panned his light into the hallway.

_Come on you bastard, come on and-_

The gang-leader cried out as body fell into his arms, dribbling blood and saliva over his chest, and shoved it away. His flashlight lit up the gaping wound across the man's throat, their mouth trying to form words, the hands desperatly reaching out for him again.

Hysteria rising up, he opened fire, driving the boy back against the wall. Eyes glazing over, he slowly slid to the ground, leaving a gleaming smear on the plasterboard.

They'd been using the kid as a dealer for months now, he had good instincts, plus took next to nothing from them as he thought he was auditioning to be a real part of the gang.

_Here's an audition for you Francis, can you get past the fucking lunatic with knives for hands? _

Francis clamped down on his teeth as they started to chatter, his brain popped hot, insane thoughts that made him want to shriek with laughter; _Call the police, they don't know that you don't pay your taxes!_

_You could give them the twenty-five k you've got stashed back there. _

Shit, he'd forgotten the money. It was in the darkness with the maniac, the other way lay safety and poverty. The smallest part of him said that he could always earn more, that a lost year was better than a lost life, but he _didn't _know that he could make it again, his entire self-belief rested on that cushion of bills and what it represented.

'Fuck' he swore quietly.

_He's got knives, you've got a fucking MAC-10, wrap it up._

Francis left the hallway, trying to ignore the way the pool of blood tugged at his feet, and quickly searched each room with the flashlight as he passed. Already he could hear the faint whooping of sirens in the distance, five-o would ignore most anything that happened in this neighbourhood but sustained gunfire was far more disagreeable than a single, stray pistol shot.

_Step it up, step it up._

He reached the final room, keeping the Ingram up and trained on the doorway as he used his other hand to lever at the loose floorboard, the wood lodging splinters in his fingers. Francis lifted the gym-bag carefully free, as though it would be the deciding noise that gave him away, and looped it over one shoulder.

1 was standing in the hallway.

Francis blinked, unsure if his nerves had finally snapped, then yanked down on the trigger. The Ingram bucked in his grip, jerking from side to side, and peppered the doorway with the remainder of the clip.

He stared through the thin air of smoke.

_Fuck is he? A ghost?_

He ejected the last clip as though sliding a nuclear rod out of its containment chamber, and pushed the last one home in the same way, resting his hand on the cocking lever.

_Do it! _

Francis chambered the first round, instantly feeling a tide of relief, then he heard the sirens far louder than before.

He raised the Ingram and put a line of bullets through the walls either side of the doorway, listening for any cry of agony or body thudding to the floor.

_Nothing! He's not there, so go, MOVE!_

Gym-bag slamming into his hip, Francis slid out into the hallway and covered both directions before moving for the broken window. The whole thing didn't really feel real anymore, so much adrenaline had been shot into his system that his body was one giant heart; limbs surging and twitching, pulse raging all over like an electric current, he felt like his mind was dictating instructions he hadn't even thought to give it yet.

Francis raced through the room with the kid, he saw the window, that beautiful pool of light on the floor.

A stitch ripped through his side.

Grunting, he shrugged it off and kept running, then looked down in confusion as the strength dropped out of his legs. He crumpled to the floor, reaching back to the pain and feeling his hand come away slippery. Francis rolled onto his back, starting to laugh as blood pumped from his right kidney, and saw 1 standing over him.

It no longer seemed very important, but he lifted the Ingram, it seemed to weigh far more than he remembered.

He had it level when the submachine-gun was taken out of his hands, almost gently, and Francis saw 1 cradling the weapon with great care.

_Going....going to take care of it. _

Francis nodded in approval, light-headed as he felt blood lick at his hand, and was barely conscious when the punch-dagger struck home.

He was found with the gym-bag still over his shoulder, every dollar intact inside, and amongst his contempt the officer who uncovered it briefly considered if any of the money would be missed.

That moment of weakness would have made Francis McCormick very happy indeed.


	22. Chapter 22

'Anvil confirmed'.

Diana felt her heart seize, 'are you su-..'.

The voice cut her off; 'anvil confirmed'.

She hung up the phone and swallowed, feeling her hand tremble on the receiver.

_You knew this was coming. _

'Yes' she said quietly, then, louder, 'yes'.

The last word awkwardly cut through the silence and pushed her into motion, she crossed the room and opened the cabinet. Dropping the kevlar vest over her blouse, Diana secured the clips and tightened it up. She checked the chamber of the S&W Lady Smith and slid the revolver into its shoulder holster, looping the bracing over her head before fastening it up and unconsciously touching the two speed-loaders in the side pouches now nestling against her right ribs.

There were more powerful handguns, certainly more expensive ones, but the Lady Smith suited her just fine. Diana subscribed to discipline in shooting just as in life, an automatic meant lazy confidence, fifteen chances instead of five, but if she missed those first five then what the hell was she doing with a gun anyway?

The door to her office opened, as was expected, but she still found her hand going to the revolver. Four men swept inside, MP5 sub-machine guns instinctively panning the room, the lead one turned his attention to her; 'Ms Burnwood, are you ready?'.

She nodded, walking out into the corridor as they formed a loose barrier around her, finding herself watching in approval as the security detail adapted itself quickly and easily to the smallest change in environment. The men selected to guard the Merces Letifer headquarters were water-tight.

In every aspect, Diana reflected, as she had amused herself in the past by lightly flirting with them and drawing grim or confused responses.

Many of them were ex special-forces, some were even ex-operatives for the company, but it seemed they'd all rather face an invasion than the wiles of a woman.

_Focus, don't get distracted._

'Where is he?' she asked.

The same man from before gave her a quick glance, 'main lobby, ma'am, area is locked down, subject has been disarmed and is considered pacified'.

Diana snorted, 'don't kid yourself'.

'We are well aware of his capabilities, Ms Burnwood, rest assured'.

'Are they moving him?'.

'That's confirmed' the agent responded, 'he's being taken to interrogation room C, the other man is in E'.

'Other man?'.

'Stephen Neal, we're taking you to him now'.

She could tell by the way the agent said it that he would rather be doing the exact opposite, but these were her set orders. They had required a long and heated argument with Aubrey to be approved, of course, and the explicit understanding that she would be considered expendable if a hostage situation ensued.

_Fine by me, let them hide in their armoured room if that's what they want. _

Diana reconsidered exactly why she needed to do this, it had seemed like a fine idea at the time, backed by solid reasoning, but as the elevator lights winked off each passing floor a definite feeling of panic was setting in.

She wasn't the only responsible for Vitorrio, everyone had had a hand in that, so why was she the only one who felt the need to explain herself? There were plenty of operatives under her charge that she had never become attached to, she only needed to remind herself of what they did to stop that, but there was a peculiar innocence to 47 which had drawn her in despite her rules.

_Innocence? He's murdered countless people. _

Diana shook her head, she couldn't really explain it, just that when they had talked she sensed a man not so much numb to what he was doing but resigned to it, somehow imprisoned by it.

_You're projecting, you've been alone for too long, you want to believe you can find a heart in the most lethal man alive. It's schoolgirl bullshit. _

Yes, yes, she _knew_ that.

_But you don't believe it, do you?_

The elevator doors slid open, revealing a long, featureless corridor, pipes ran overhead and the white breeze-block walls were murky and spotted with dirt.

Even a company like Merces Letifer wasn't immune to last minute oversight and incompetence. They had spent countless millions resculpting the main building to their specifications when someone decided that it might be necessary to store dangerous people here from time to time. That clashed badly with the current plans, most of which were complete by that period, so a remainder of the budget was diverted to installing these rooms in the old basement archives.

She doubted any of her co-workers had ever been down here.

Diana drew the Lady Smith, earning a frown from the agent, 'that's not necessary ma'am, we can handle it'.

'What's your name?'.

The agent hesitated, as though sensing he'd crossed a line, 'Brooks'.

Diana readied herself to berate the man then found it just wasn't in her, she was too confused right now, that wasn't good.

'Would you go unarmed into a combat zone, Mr Brooks?'.

He straightened, 'No ma'am'.

'Me neither. Treat this man as hostile'.

Brooks snapped a nod, 'safeties off!'.

There was a series of clicks as his men adjusted their weapons.

'Secure that room'.

Three of the agents jogged down the corridor, raising their weapons as they came to a reinforced window, 'subject is secure'.

Diana nodded, pushing past Brooks and walking down to stand beside them.

Stephen Neal sat behind a steel table, head bowed, his forearms resting on the surface. He was pale and looked hurt, taking deep, even breaths as though to try and regulate the pain, his right shoulder was dotted with blood.

Diana watched him for a minute, unsure, then held up her identity card to the scanner and disengaged the door lock. Neal looked up as she walked inside, showing a weary smile, and nodded to the agents as they fanned out and covered him from different angles.

'Hello Diana'.

'Stephen, do you need medical attention?'.

He shrugged, 'my left eardrum is perforated, but that can wait. Why am I in here?'.

She kept the revolver loosely trained on him, 'you said you wouldn't take the job, were quite insistent about it actually. Now all of a sudden you show up with 47 gift-wrapped'.

'Ah yes' he smiled, leaning back in the chair and chuckling as the agents twitched their weapons in response, 'take it easy boys, on my best day I couldn't take you all'.

He thought for a moment, 'to tell the truth, I had somewhat of an epiphany'.

Diana snorted, 'I don't have time for this'.

'It's true!' Neal said, 'I realised something about 47. I went beyond the legend, the scary stories, and something became apparent'.

'What?'.

'Such people aren't born, they're _made_. But then you'd know that, wouldn't you?'.

She raised the revolver and cocked it, 'there was only one way for you to get that information'.

'He told me everything' Neal said, 'and you've just confirmed it'.

Neal's breathing was faster now, sweat budded on his face, he was staring at Diana but didn't seem to be seeing her at all.

She _knew_ these symptoms.

'Get out!' she yelled at Brooks, 'clear the room!'.

He looked at her in confusion, unable to see any danger, when Neal sprang from the chair and rushed at the nearest man. The assassin knocked the MP5 to one side as it fired, punching dents in the table, and drove his elbow into the agent's windpipe.

Throwing both hands up to his neck, the man didn't struggle as Neal darted behind him. Diana and the agents opened fire, blasting chunks from the wall where he had stood a second ago and catching their team-member in a hail of bullets.

The man started to fall as his kevlar was torn to pieces, Neal wrapped one arm around his neck to hold him up and grabbed the MP5 as it swung loose. He clicked the selector up to full-auto and sprayed the room, the roar of gunfire sending hot lances of pain through his ruined eardrum. Rounds caught one of the men in the arm, chest and head, blowing a treacly smear of brain matter across the wall as he went down.

One bolted for cover in the corridor and Neal caught him with a burst, armour stopping the rounds but not their impact, they hit as hard as steel punches and drove his body into the wall where he fell unconscious. The MP5 snapped empty, Neal saw Brooks loading another clip into his own weapon and charged, hitting the agent before he was able to pull the cocking handle.

He rocked Brooks with three hard jabs to the face, the force of them snapping the older man's head back. Blinking away white spots, Brooks answered by grabbing Neal's shoulder and arm and driving a knee into his groin. Pain blasted through the assassin, he hit the floor and lashed his leg round, catching Brooks behind the knee and toppling the agent.

Brooks shot a hand down to his ankle and Neal took advantage of the moment to close on him. The agent was back on his feet too quickly, and Neal only realised when he saw the glint of steel that he had been going for a concealed knife.

He kept up his momentum, sweeping an arm inside of Brooks' lunge, crying out as the blade sliced along the length of his forearm, and slammed his free fist into the other man's sternum. The blow came with two hundred and forty pounds of pressure behind it, putting Brooks into the wall and winding him, but the agent's kevlar vest absorbed the worst of it.

Neal had never felt like this before, his muscles had transformed from bundles which ached and stretched into centres of raw energy. The trail of fire across his forearm, bleeding freely, didn't even slow him down as he grabbed Brooks' wrist and bashed his hand against the wall.

The agent's grip sprang open, dropping the knife, and he struggled as Neal clamped a hand around his throat and choked the life out of him.

Neal didn't even realise he was laughing.

_This is wonderful._

Brooks pistoned kicks into the assassin's body, grabbed his head and dug two thumbs into his eye sockets, but Neal just responded by bearing down like a vice until the agent's struggles ceased and his neck let out a dull snap.

Gasping, he released Brooks and let him fall, staggering back a step as his vision washed in and out of focus. He saw a blurred figure laying on the floor, lifting its arm as though asking for help, and a gunshot cracked the air. Neal grunted as the round punched him in the chest, he was steadying himself when four more rang out in quick succession, slamming him against the window.

He slid to the ground, face twisted in pain, and crushed his eyes shut.

Diana stood, supporting herself against the table, and touched two fingers to her head. They came away slick, a bullet had nicked her scalp, she felt a wave of dizziness and gripped the steel surface until it subsided.

The room stank. Cordite mingled with the musty stench of excrement, she saw the splatter of brain on the wall and turned away to vomit, bile burning her throat.

_Oh god, oh god.._

Diana went for the doorway, pulling up short when she heard the _click_.

She levelled the Lady Smith and turned, seeing Neal pointing a dead agent's Glock at her, his aim wavering from side to side. His teeth were bared, one eye was leaking a bloody tear.

'Should have gone for the head' she muttered.

_'Don't...so hard on yourself' _Neal croaked, _'still...hurt like bastard'. _

Diana contemplated dodging out of the doorway, reloading the Lady Smith, but the gun trained on her induced a watery fear that turned her limbs to lead.

'So now what?'.

_'We have...proposition..for you'. _

She blinked, 'what could you possibly have to offer me?'.

Neal grinned, the gesture horribly distorted, _'protection'. _


	23. Chapter 23

'Open it up'.

'This won't do you any good. Disabling the elevator and barring the stairwell door gives you another minute, at best'.

Neal sighed, bringing up the MP5, 'then none of this matters, so open it, _now'._

Diana stared at him for a moment, sweat shone on his brow and the eyes beneath were shot through with red. He was getting weaker by the second, she knew enough to hurt him.

_Then you hurt him, and everything goes back to like it was before. He dies, and so does 47. _

She couldn't do it, she had to know.

Diana swiped her card down the scanner and the lock clicked open, Neal led her inside and closed the door behind them.

47 sat behind the table, his face a smear of yellow and purple bruising.

'Hello Diana'.

She made a show of checking her watch, 'you've got two minutes before they get down here and kill you both, say your piece'.

'Neal, are you alright?'.

The other man dredged up a smile, blood seeped between the fingers clamped over his arm, 'not so good, take the MP5. I need to patch myself up'.

He passed over the weapon and opened the plastic first-aid kit snatched from the corridor, dashing out the contents onto the table, 'gauze and band-aids, good job I'm not hurt'.

Diana shook her head, 'you didn't need to kill those guards, but then that's a side-effect of combat cocktails, isn't it? Lapses in judgement, that's why we don't tolerate their use. One minute and a half'.

'That feral half-brother of mine' 47 said, 'he's on his way here'.

Diana folded her arms, 'he doesn't know the location of this building or any primary targets. Try again'.

47 stood, moving stiffly as the bracing around his ribs constricted, 'you've underestimated him. Just like you did me. All you see is a feral dog but he's capable of everything that I am'.

'I don't believe that. Seventy seconds'.

'I _know_ him. Pain is his trigger, I saw it, Ort-Meyer didn't make him less he just made him different, please Diana, you have to listen to me!'.

Neal looked between them, gritting his teeth as he roughly sealed the gash on his arm with a skin stapler, 'give me the gun, I can buy you another minute'.

Considering, 47 slid the MP5 across the table, 'don't kill anyone, just keep their heads down then get back here'.

Neal nodded, snatching up the sub machine-gun and leaving the room.

47 and Diana regarded each other, 'you owe me' he said finally.

She sighed, slumping down into the chair, 'why is it me that owes you? Why not Glass, or Aubrey?'.

'Because I trusted you' he said, 'we worked together for over fifteen years'.

'So...what?' she snapped, 'you know this business, _your_ business. You were created as a weapon, you killed for all those years, then all of a sudden the rules are supposed to change. Why? Because you thought you'd give a conscience a try, that you'd suddenly discovered a heart!'.

Diana sneered, allowing her arms to fall back to the table from where they'd risen in mock revelation, 'Ort-Meyer signed over your life to us because he wanted a bigger petri-dish to see what you grew into, allowing you to leave was never an option. There's no place for you out there, no happy ending, just the thin end of a wedge between living and dead'.

47 looked up, glaring, 'you think I don't know this? You think every instinct in my body isn't crying out to snap your neck? But I fight it because the act of doing so is enough! Because every time I step back and question it forces my mind to see a different way! I know I'm going to lose, doing so is already hard-coded into me, but what am I if I don't even try?'.

Gunshots rang down the corridor, the popping of semi-automatic fire.

'Time's almost up' Diana said.

'You know I'm right. Talk to Aubrey, let me deal with the clone. Once this is over I swear off my vendetta'.

Diana stood, pushing the chair back with a metallic shriek, 'there's no guarantee we'll do the same. Do you understand that?'.

He nodded slowly.

'Alright then'.

Diana walked out into the corridor, seeing Neal at the farthest end blind-firing around a corner. She keyed in an eleven digit combination into the pad outside the interrogation room, triggering two inch thick security barriers to grind down from the ceiling.

Neal turned at the noise and sprinted back, discarding the MP5.

'I'm sorry' Diana shouted, 'but you chose the wrong side'.

He cried out in rage as the barrier slid home, falling to his knees in exhaustion.

Canisters of tear-gas ricocheted around the corner, rolling past Neal and blotting out his world. Anger blasted through him at the injustice of it all, the betrayal, until in one bracing moment he realised that 47 had never promised him anything, it had all been created in his own mind and taken as a silent understanding.

Automatic fire pinned him to the security barrier, shredding his kevlar, the pain turned his body into a giant, flaming beacon. Neal looked down and saw a flake of tobacco on the back of his right hand, which was so strange as he made a point of never smoking.

Watching the approaching figures through a blur of tears, he rasped out laughter even as his lungs filled with blood, amused by the part of him that was still screaming out for a gun like a bawling child.

_Still want to be a hero. _

He took one final breath and closed his eyes.

_But you chose the wrong side._


End file.
